


Macaroni

by ineffmoth



Series: Fools [2]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Action, Canon-Typical Violence, Humor, Janey and Athena's Big Fat Pandoran Wedding, M/M, Pandora Style Fluff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-05-30
Packaged: 2020-01-25 19:19:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 28,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18580939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ineffmoth/pseuds/ineffmoth
Summary: Rhys gets a job. Angel gets the girl. Jack gets a clue. Well. He’s getting there.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this is a direct sequel to Only Fools. if you haven't, i recommend you go back and read that first!

The first time Rhys saw Butt Stallion walk across the living room he nearly had a heart attack. He also screamed, which made Jack come bursting out of the bathroom with nothing but a towel around his waist, his toothbrush still in his unmasked mouth, and a pistol at the ready.

“ _Whath ith it?_ ” he yelled, looking wildly around, a trail of toothpaste dribbling down his chin. “ _Whath the fuch?_ ”

It didn’t take long for him to register that there was no terrifying assassin intruder in the penthouse, or even anything happening at all. There was only Rhys, standing by the big leather arm chair, coffee dripping down the side of his mug, and Butt Stallion, gently swishing her braided tail in her new spot by the trophy cabinet. He lowered the gun, took the toothbrush out of his mouth, and looked to Rhys for explanation.

“Your horse moved,” Rhys said guiltily.

“Yeah, it’s a –” Jack began, then gave up. He sighed in exasperation and trudged back into the bathroom, muttering under his breath as he went.

Rhys couldn’t bring himself to feel too bad about it. One month he had been living with Jack, spending a good chunk of that time luxuriating in the expansive living room with the enormous flat screen and every ECHOsim produced in the last decade, and he’d never seen the horse move. Until now.

He crossed over to her. She eyed him warily – Rhys assumed it was wariness; her diamond face didn’t allow for much expression – but nickered quietly as he reached out to pat her on the nose.

“You’re just shy, aren’t you?” he cooed. “I’m so happy you finally decided to trust me.”

Butt Stallion remained silent.

“Unless you were making fun of me,” Rhys said.

Butt Stallion snorted. He decided to take that as a sound of protest and not one of affirmation – she was just a sweet lil’ ol’ diamond pony who would never be mean to Rhys, after all – and patted her again.

One month he’d been living here, and things had settled into a weird sort of pseudo-normalcy. Rhys had gotten over those awkward first few days of “where do I put my socks?” and “what am I allowed to touch?” and now had started to sprawl out and dig in. He had a favorite pillow in Jack’s bed, a favorite mug in his cupboard (the ironic Dahl one that Jack had drawn dicks all over), and even a small space carved out in the study where he worked on his arm or coded idly or just sat backwards in his chair, watching Jack hunched over with a screwdriver and his tongue between his teeth.

Things couldn’t be called routine. Life on Helios was too chaotic for that. But there was a predictability to it all the same, a comforting familiarity in the manner in which things went, if not exactly the things themselves.

Jack worked constantly.

Even when he wasn’t working, he was working, and despite his repeated insistence that he killed people for pinging his personal ECHO during off-hours, they did it anyway. It was rare to go more than a few days in a row without it beeping in the middle of dinner or a date in Robotics (“Thirty minutes to mod your cleaning bot and then we make ‘em fight to the death. And no using your ECHOeye this time, you shameless cheat.” “I only did that because you sabotaged my wiring first!” “Pft, babe, do you really think I would do something as underhanded and petty as fix a toy robot fight?” “Yes, absolutely!”) or, one genuinely annoying time, while Rhys was wearing fishnets.

Fishnets incident aside, Rhys didn’t really mind. In fact, he found it endearing, watching Jack become absorbed in some problem to the point of forgetting everything else. He was fastidious and focused and driven. He demanded perfection – from his employees, but also from himself. Failure was unacceptable. Rhys sometimes thought Jack could force Pandora to start turning on its axis if the alternative was a dip in Hyperion’s bottom line.

Rhys was also a little envious. Being constantly on call in case of disaster must’ve been stressful, no matter how well Jack played it off, but it was at least meaningful. While Jack was off on some mad tear through Helios, Rhys had nothing but frivolous hobbies to occupy his time.

He played a lot of ECHOsims. He watched a lot of bad television. _As Promethea Burns_ had taken a real dip in quality since they killed off Barbara, so he mostly stuck to Eden sitcoms that were so unfunny they became funny again. He went window shopping down in the hub, which was a lot more enjoyable now that he had Jack’s limitless credit chip to spend with. There was an old school arcade across Helios where you could play truly ancient video games that didn’t have ECHO compatibility, and he liked to go there a lot, too. But it all felt kind of pointless.

Rhys wasn’t bored, but he didn’t feel like he had a purpose, either. All he did was drift pleasantly in Jack’s wake. And whenever Jack wasn’t around, he couldn’t help but feel a little lonely. A little isolated.

Rhys had eventually gotten to speak directly to his parents and explain what had happened in a coherent manner. He tried to gloss over most of the more hair-raising details, which meant it was a much shorter story. The ultra G-rated version of events certainly didn’t have any human experimentation in it. Unfortunately, he was also incapable of lying to his mother, so they did end up with at least the skeleton of the truth. The important thing, he tried to emphasize, was that he was alive and unharmed and happy. What more could you want for your child in this crazy, dangerous universe, really?

His parents’ respectively worried and unimpressed faces stared back up at him from the ECHO screen.

“So you quit your job to move in with a man you’ve known for a month,” was his mother’s take away. “I guess I should be grateful you didn’t call to tell us you’re pregnant.”

Rhys felt that this was being just a little bit unfair.

“Are you sure there’s no legal action we can take?” had been his father’s concern. “You didn’t sign anything, did you, sport?”

“No, Dad, I didn’t sign anything,” Rhys said. He did have _some_ common sense. “And I’d rather just move on. I don’t want to make it into a big thing.”

“If you’re sure…”

“I’ll start setting aside some money to wire you when you need to buy a ticket back to Persephone,” his mother sighed.

“Mom, please,” Rhys said. “That’s not going to happen. Everything is…really good.”

“I’m just being realistic, dear,” she said. “Men always let you down. Take it from me.”

Rhys glanced at his father, but he seemed unperturbed by this statement.

“It’s better to hedge your bets,” she went on.

“I’m not going to – look, if it doesn’t work out, I’ll let you say ‘I told you so,’ how about that?” Rhys said. “I won’t even roll my eyes.”

His mother hummed, unconvinced. Rhys sighed.

“Where is this so called ‘Handsome Jack’ right now, anyway?” she asked, as if she didn’t live within spitting distance of Hyperion’s Klypso monolith and had never heard of him before. “I’d like to see him with my own two eyes, I think.”

“Huh? What was that?” Rhys said. “Just had a ping that cut you off. Sorry, but it looks like I have another call coming in and it’s really, super important! I’ll have to call you back some other time. Love you, gotta go, bye!” He hung up.

So that hadn’t gone spectacularly, but he did get to have his regular calls home again, and that helped a bit. When she wasn’t nagging him or criticizing Rhys’ every life decision, his mother was a godsend of dry, cutting humor and actually useful advice. (“Never trust someone who doesn’t own any tupperware, Rhys. It means they’re wasteful and they don’t share.”)

Nonetheless, she was on the other side of the universe, and they only talked once or twice a week. Outside of Jack, Rhys really didn’t have anyone he could call a friend. When he woke in the morning, there wasn’t anywhere he needed to be. He merely got up when he chose and made himself coffee in the sterile kitchen (yes, there was tupperware, although Rhys wasn’t sure this qualified as a saving grace given Jack’s many, many other failings) and tried to recall what it was like to have obligations or plans.

Which was not to say that all he did was laze around. When Jack wasn’t working, he had an unending well of energy and a never ceasing drive to be doing – never the same thing twice, and always with Rhys.

They took a weekend trip down to Opportunity – now nearly complete – and had lunch on a hover-ship over the water where they could watch whales the size of skyscrapers breaching in the distance. Even closer to where they stood leaning against the ship’s rail, vicious sharks with rows and rows of saw-like teeth leapt into the shallows to grab threshers and drag them back down into the depths. The terrifying nature of this excursion was tempered by how lovely the sunlight was as it glinted off the waves, and the schools of tiny, orange fish that flitted about just over the ship’s edge. They looked like coins and buzzed with a high-pitched, quiet sound that was almost like singing.

Another time, Rhys accepted Jack’s offer for a moonlit stroll, only to find himself down on Elpis, hop-running unsteadily away from kraggons, mere feet from a sheer drop-off into lava. After an intense few minutes during which Jack gleefully leapt and slammed and shot and filled the air with rock spray while Rhys screamed, did mid-air cartwheels, and tried not to be sick, they cleared an outcropping that overlooked the canyon and spent a long hour throwing rocks of steadily increasing size into the boiling liquid heat below.

“What we need,” Rhys said, watching a large boulder they had pushed together fizzle and disappear into nothingness, “is a trebuchet.”

“A ballista would be more effective, but the see-saw image really is more satisfying,” Jack said.

They ended up crouched down in the moon dust, drawing catapult plans and debating the merits of counterweights versus traction.

At one point, Jack pretended to trip and fall over the cliff’s edge, only to boost safely back up using his Oz kit. Rhys did not find this nearly as amusing as Jack did.

Rhys also finally met Nisha in person when she came up for poker night partway through the month. She was just as intimidating as Rhys had imagined, if not more so because of the way she greeted Jack – by threatening to rip his balls off if he ever tried to interfere with the way she ran Lynchwood so blatantly again. Rhys didn’t know what this was in reference to, but didn’t need to in order to believe she meant it.

Jack seemed to believe it, too, because he said, “Geeze, fine, it was just a couple of night raids, didn’t think it would be that big of deal, didn’t even find what I was looking for, but whatever. You’re the meriff, I guess. Can we play some friggin’ poker now?”

They did play poker. Rhys was terrible at it.

“Rhys, it’s a game about bluffing,” Jack said as Nisha used an arm to drag the pile of cash toward her side of the table. She already had an impressive hoard going. “You can’t start grinning every time you draw a good card. How did you ever convince Tediore that you’d make a decent spy?”

“It wasn’t like there was an aptitude test first!” Rhys defended. “They kind of just threw me at you and hoped I would stick!”

Nisha stopped in her counting to look at Rhys sharply.

“Oh?” she asked lazily. “Come to think of it, I never did hear what hole you crawled out of.” The ‘because I didn’t care until just now’ was implied.

And so Rhys had been forced to recount the whole thing once again, this time including the human experimentation. When he was done, Nisha poured him a shot of the strongest whiskey Rhys had ever tasted and told him they could see his hand reflected in the window behind him. Rhys glared at Jack, who pretended he hadn’t noticed.

“You’re alright, kid,” Nisha said as she was leaving. “Call me if you ever need me to kick Jack’s ass. I’m always looking for an excuse.”

Then she’d put on her worn, leather cowboy hat and swept out of the room, her duster billowing out behind her as she went, and Rhys had, just a teensy-weensy microscopic amount, fallen in love.

“She punches kittens, you know,” Jack said from next to him.

“What?” Rhys gaped at him. “No, she doesn’t. Stop lying.”

“I’m not lying, she’ll tell you if you ask,” Jack said. “She’s like weirdly proud of it. Kittens, Rhys. The little fuzzy guys with the whiskers.”

“I know what a kitten is.”

“Okay, well, do you know what a kitten sounds like when someone’s knuckles collide with its –”

“La la la la la! I can’t hear you!” Rhys shouted, slapping his hands over his ears. “I’m thinking about nice things and not whatever dumb, untrue thing you’re saying!”

“I’ve never punched a kitten, babe!” Jack shouted over him. “That’s all I’m saying!”

They did all this and more.

They made each other laugh and stood side by side in the gun range and bickered good naturedly about the way Jack never bothered to lock his front door. They had a nearly obscene amount of sex. When Jack came home late at night, Rhys kissed the places under his mask where the skin had been rubbed sore and tender and, in the morning when they woke, Rhys would kiss his bare face again and secretly think to himself, _here’s something to keep with you under there, just in case you need it later._

So, yes, Rhys felt lonely and lost sometimes, but who didn’t? And could he complain? Rhys was also the happiest he’d been in many, many years. He wanted for nothing. He had Jack, he had anything he could think to ask for, he had his ficus, carefully repotted and thriving next to the window.

And now he had, at long last, the final confirmation that Butt Stallion herself was, in actual fact, a living, breathing diamond horse. Plus maybe her undying forever friendship. Rhys couldn’t wait to feed her sugar cubes from the palm of his hand.

Life was good.

It was perhaps a testament to how good life was that it took Rhys as long as it did to realize something strange was going on.

*

It hit him out of left field one afternoon while he was taking the shuttle across Helios to the arcade. A pair of women were sitting a few seats down from him, talking quietly, but still loud enough for him to overhear.

“He’s so dreamy,” one of them sighed.

Rhys looked up, curious who they were talking about, and followed their adoring gazes to a huge poster of Jack that hung on the shuttle wall. He was standing in front of a large pile of cash, looking at his wrist in an exaggerated manner. He wasn’t wearing a watch.

‘However hard you’re working right now,’ a blurb next to him read, ‘if you have time to read this, you could be working harder!’

Rhys rolled his eyes. Of course.

“You ever wonder what it would be like to touch him?” the other woman asked. “Not in a creepy way. Just, like, on the hand.”

 _That’s still creepy_ , Rhys thought.

“Oh, I think about touching him all the time,” the first woman said.

Rhys grimaced uncontrollably. He must’ve made some kind of sound, too, because both women flushed bright red. They turned to glare, as if it was rude of him to be massively uncomfortable with their public fantasies about his boyfriend. He wondered how embarrassed they’d be if he told them who he was.

He opened his mouth to do just that, and then stopped short.

Rhys was dating a celebrity trillionaire who was worshipped in some places like a god and nowhere more fervently than on Helios, yet these two particular worshippers didn’t know who Rhys was. That seemed a little odd. In fact.

He did some quick mental math as he recounted the last month of his life, reexamining in particular those times he had wandered the station alone. The arcade, the hub, the solarium when the mood struck him. He hadn’t spent a ton of time out around Helios on his own – the corporate uniformity kind of creeped him out – but when he had, no one seemed to ever know who he was or think much of him. They pretty much just treated him normally. Ignored him, even. There was never so much as a flash of recognition.

Jack was the most visible man in the universe. Rhys was still a total nobody.

Those numbers looked a little hinky

He stood up abruptly, startling the two women, and crossed to the shuttle doors. Arcade plans forgotten, he disembarked at the next platform. As he stood waiting for the shuttle that would take him back in the direction of the hub and Jack’s office, Rhys pulled out his ECHO.

“Handsome Jack,” he searched.

There were a staggering number and variety of results, the first and most prominent being the official Hyperion propaganda pages and their most recent press releases. A lot of them were about Hyperion business: ‘Handsome Jack Signs Trade Deal with Eunomia’ or ‘Handsome Jack Responds to Tediore Smear Campaign’ or ‘Handsome Jack Secures Contract with Anshin for Shield Technology.’ (Rhys paused at the last one, briefly distracted by a stab of interest, but forced himself to file it away for later.)

Beyond the news stories were advertisements and thinkpieces and listicles and other such garbage. One page was titled, ‘Ten Steps to Being More like Handsome Jack.’ Unless number one was “Murder Handsome Jack,” Rhys didn’t think it would be a very useful list.

The results went on. There was not even a hint of a whisper of what might be happening in Jack’s love life

Rhys scrapped the search and restarted with, “Handsome Jack fan forum.”

There were fewer results this time, but still plenty. He picked one that popped out at him – Handsome Jack Ultra Fans – and began scrolling through the topics. The first handful were just the general gushing “he’s so good looking and powerful and smart and good looking and funny and rich and good looking and…” as one could might expect, but from there it got pretty weird, pretty quickly.

“Oooookay,” Rhys said nervously as he flipped past discussions about what kind of underwear Jack wore ( _none, narcissist that he is_ , Rhys thought) and how he took his coffee ( _with enough cream and sugar to give a normal person diabetes_ ) and “How would you most like Jack to murder you?”

Rhys may have briefly whited out at that one.

 _Maybe people just don’t care about whether or not he’s dating anyone_ , Rhys thought, forcing himself to resume scrolling.

He paused over a thread titled, ‘Approximate Size of Handsome Jack’s Dick as Estimated from Press Photos.’

Okay, yeah, that seemed unlikely.

He scrolled back up to ‘Recent Spottings’ and clicked through. All the photos were candids, albeit suspiciously well framed and attractive ones – there were definitely none of Jack sneezing or talking with his mouth full or halfway through a blink. They also framed only him, cropping out anyone else who might be with him. For a moment Rhys thought they had all been taken while Jack was working, until he came across one that was undeniably set in the low lighting of the jazz lounge where they had gotten drinks just two nights ago. Rhys could see his ECHO on the table where he had left it when he got up to go to the bathroom.

“He’s so cultured!” was one of the comments. “Do you think he goes there to wind down after a stressful day of work?”

Rhys had been the one who wanted to go see the live theremin quartet, actually. At one point Jack had leaned over and half-jokingly asked when the beat was going to drop.

That wasn’t the problem here, though. The problem was. Well, the issue at hand was really. So what it boiled down to, when you sat down and looked at it, was just that.

“Did you hear the rumor that Jack’s dating someone???” came a sudden post, finally.

“That was debunked weeks ago,” someone had replied. “It’s just those R&D freaks making shit up again. Like that time they said there’s still a closed off level of Helios filled with space hurps-infected cannibals.”

“LOL that’s good to know. I had started sharpening a shiv.”

Rhys turned off his ECHO and shoved it back in its holster on his hip in frustration. Then, as he boarded the shuttle back to the hub, he had a thought and pulled it out again.

Following his miraculous resurrection before the eyes of the lab assistant group chat, Rhys had been first subjected to an onslaught of barely coherent hatred (“BOOOO!” and “Oh my god…” and “That’s a shame.”) and then permabanned. He hadn’t been too disappointed at the time and had left well enough alone, satisfied with his final triumph and farewell. It wasn’t like a permaban could honestly stop him if he really wanted in, anyway. Like now, for example.

It only took a matter of moments to crack Benson’s credentials and access his account. Rhys politely ignored the long private message chain between him and Ines and began scrolling quickly through the public group chat, barely pausing to skim. He did glean that Dr. Jane had returned to work – there were a lot of posts about how unfriendly and standoffish she’d become since the varkid incident.

 _Well, yeah,_ Rhys thought. _The last time she trusted a lab assistant, she nearly died._

Finally, he reached far enough back that the time stamps matched up with when Rhys had been working in R&D. But neither of his posts were there. Not the photo of him down on Opportunity’s new beachfront, sunglasses on, Jack’s bare arm just visible where it was resting against his, with the caption, “Surprise! 8) I lived.” and not the one of him and Jack in the tub either. The only photographic evidence that Jack and Rhys had ever been in the same room together had mysteriously vanished.

Or not so mysteriously.

Rhys put his ECHO away again, this time with finality.

Jack was doing something, that much was obvious, but what it was exactly or why he was doing it or how was a mystery. A bizarre and borderline creepy mystery. And the only thing creepier than the thought that no one on Helios knew Rhys even existed (R&D freaks aside) was the thought of what these people would do if they found out. Something shiv-related, apparently! So that was great!

Rhys rubbed at his ECHO port with his flesh hand, trying to ease out some of the little static shocks that had started running just under his skin. This was the weirdest relationship insecurity he had ever had in his life. No, he took that back. This was still second place to ‘accidentally fell in love with the man I’m supposed to be robbing.’

Why was he even surprised anymore?

He took the elevator up to Jack’s office and breezed past the receptionist – her name was Meg and she was exceptionally polite, which was suspicious, given what her job was – and entered through the double doors without waiting for permission.

Jack was alone, sitting in his big yellow chair with his legs kicked up on his desk, tossing a small ball in the air and catching it. He looked idle enough, but Rhys knew that didn’t necessarily mean anything. It was dangerous to assume that Jack was ever not up to something. He looked up as Rhys entered and caught the ball one more time, a grin spreading across his face.

“And here I was thinking you were never going to take me up on my offer to try out the chair,” Jack said. “I’ll still be in it, of course.” He seemed to cotton on to Rhys’ mood as he came up the steps and rounded the desk, because his smile slipped. “Or I can be out of it, if that’s really what you want. Up to you.”

“Is there a sealed off level of Helios filled with space hurps-infected cannibals?” Rhys asked without preamble.

Jack’s legs dropped to the floor and he sat up straighter. “Who told you that?”

“No one, it was denied in the same breath as the idea of you currently dating someone, which is, frighteningly enough, the thing I find more concerning,” Rhys said. “But we’re returning to the space hurps cannibal situation later because that’s fucked up if true.”

“Okay, I think I need the bluff notes on the part of this conversation that happened before I entered it,” Jack said.

“Why does no one know that we’re dating?” Rhys asked.

“Because my fans are insane and would try to push you out an open airlock if they thought they could get away with it?” Jack said.

“Yeah, that’s really weird,” Rhys said. “Are you saying they _could_ get away with it?”

“No!” Jack said with feeling.

“Then, again, I have to ask, why –”

Jack’s shoulders hunched defensively. “It’s just safer this way!”

“You just said –”

“Look,” Jack interrupted again. “You have no idea what it’s like, okay? People constantly digging into your life, looking for shit to stir up, thinking you owe them something just because you’re better than them.”

“Oh, like you don’t love it.”

“Yeah, but I’m _me_! And you’re not!”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Rhys spluttered

“Are you saying you _want_ people sending you fan mail containing their innermost thoughts and fantasies and trying to steal hair samples from rooms you’ve recently been in?” Jack asked. “Because if so, say the word, I can set up a press conference!”

“No,” Rhys said mulishly. “I just wish you’d, I don’t know, mentioned it to me! Or asked or something! You just decided what to do and did it and I only accidentally noticed and it’s super, super weird!”

“But it’s better this way, right?” Jack said, edging into frustrated confusion. “I’m right, aren’t I? You never even thought to worry about it until it was already taken care of. So what’s the problem?”

Rhys sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He could feel the buzz of annoyance simmering under his skin but he didn’t know what to do with it or where it was even coming from. Maybe there wasn’t a problem. Maybe he was making a big deal out of nothing.

“How are you doing it anyway?” he asked. “Aren’t there paparazzi or something? People should’ve at least noticed…”

“Paparazzi, are you kidding?” Jack scoffed. “On Helios? The only media on this station is the stuff I create. Nothing goes to print without my say so. If they tried it, I’d rip their intestines out of their assholes. That’s not just hyperbole, by the way.”

“Ew?”

“As for noticing, it’s not like we’re down humping in the Hub of Heroism, are we?” Jack continued. “When they see us together, most people aren’t going to start forming crazy theories –”

“Crazy,” Rhys parroted flatly.

“– about how Handsome J is locked down, they’re going to write it off as business,” Jack finished. “And, yes, crazy, you’re one in a billion, babe. The chances of you are astronomical.”

Rhys softened a little.

He thought it was pretty unlikely that anyone who had seen them together in the jazz lounge – elbows pressed together, foreheads nearly touching, Jack’s fingers bumping absently against Rhys’ cybernetic hand as he murmured something unrepeatable – had thought they were there to do budget reviews. Either Jack was carefully omitting a large number of bribes and threats that had traded hands behind Rhys’ back or the thing Rhys had been written off as by dozens of Helios residents was some kind of sordid one-night stand. Who was he kidding? It was probably both.

But on the other hand, jazz lounge aside, it really wasn’t like they ran around doing PDA and holding hands and staring soulfully into each other’s eyes. A portion of R&D knew about it, of course, but nobody listened to scientists, apparently. There had been those medics and security guards who had seen them making out that one time, but those people were basically paid to keep their mouths shut. As for the rest of it… Well, if someone saw what looked like Jack being sweet on someone, they’d probably think it was a hallucination, if not business, especially when no one else was saying anything.

This whole thing was insane, but that seemed to be par for the course for his life these days. And Jack was – Rhys reluctantly admitted to himself – right. It was better this way. Not being under public scrutiny, where ‘public’ meant ‘the whole universe.’ Strange as it was, maybe he should just accept it.

He sighed and leaned against Jack’s desk. “And I assume the space hurps thing is…”

Jack grimaced and said, “It’s just one small section of maintenance and it’s in a spot that can’t be vented.”

Rhys reared back. “Jack! What the fuck!”

“Space hurps is really hard to eradicate and this is a great way to develop a vaccine,” Jack said. “Plus, eventually they’ll run out of fellow infected to eat and the last one will starve to death, so who’s getting hurt?”

“Them!” Rhys said. “And us, on the inevitable day they break free and run rampant through the station!”

“Don’t be so pessimistic,” Jack said. “They’d have to eat their way through nearly a hundred levels first. We’d be safely jettisoned way before they reached us.” He reached up to put his hands on Rhys’ waist and drag him a little closer, in between his spread legs. “You know I’d never let anything happen to you, right?”

“I can take care of myself,” Rhys said stubbornly. “And there are other people on this station.”

“Forget them,” Jack said. “They’re not important.”

“Your total disregard for human life isn’t nearly as attractive as you seem to think it is,” Rhys said. “And don’t ignore what I –”

“I’m not ignoring it,” Jack interrupted. “You can take care of yourself, sure, but you have all these pesky ‘morals’ or whatever that get in the way. I don’t. So let me take care of things instead.”

Rhys groaned. They probably weren’t talking about space hurps anymore.

“Rhys, let me take care of it,” Jack said.

Rhys hated how badly he wanted to give in. It was so easy, though, with Jack. He felt his shoulders slump.

“Okay,” he said.

One corner of Jack’s lips turned up into the start of an honest smile. He squeezed Rhys’ hips and tugged until Rhys relented and let himself fall halfway into Jack’s lap, one knee resting between his spread thighs. Jack kissed him, sweetly once, and then with hunger.

 _That’s how it is with you_ , Rhys thought as he kissed back. _It’s unfair._

One of Jack’s hands moved up Rhys’ side and dipped under his shirt, warm fingers spread wide and proprietary. Rhys leaned into the touch eagerly, and then pulled back, breaking the kiss as he remembered something else.

“I saw you signed a contract with Anshin for shield tech, by the way,” he said.

“Mmm, I sure did,” Jack said, rubbing a thumb along one of Rhys’ ribs.

“What’s up with that?” Rhys asked.

“What do you mean?” Jack asked innocently.

Rhys squinted at him, his earlier interest compounding.

“Well, Anshin’s all about health and defense,” he started. “They don’t even make weapons. But the Hyperion design philosophy is ‘the best defense is a good offense.’ Hyperion shields are even intentionally designed to exchange a weaker defense for a greater offense. So what do you have to gain from dealing with Anshin? Your goals aren’t compatible.”

“I can’t develop an interest in defensive technologies?” Jack asked. “Maybe I had a sudden change of heart.”

“No, you didn’t,” Rhys accused. “I know you. I just can’t figure out what you’re up to.”

“Then maybe you should think about it a little harder,” Jack said. There was a teasing curl to his lips.

“Come on, you can’t just tell me?”

“Where would be the fun in that?” Jack said. “I want to see what you come up with.”

Rhys scowled down at him. “Anshin just doesn’t make sense,” he insisted. “If you’re shifting focus into shield tech, Vladof is the best match.”

“Ooh, you think I’d get in bed with the commies?” Jack asked. “What for?”

“For the bullet absorption,” Rhys said. “Because their shields can absorb kinetic energy from bullet impact and use it to digistruct new –” He stopped. “Which is technology you’ve already mostly ripped from Tediore…”

“Yeah, here we go,” Jack said, a fascinated gleam in his eyes. “Oh, babe, you’re so close I can taste it. God this is sexy.”

“Ugh, you’re impossible,” Rhys complained, blushing. “I will figure it out, you know.”

“Let me know when you do,” Jack said. “I want to see the look on your face when it happens. It’s gonna be prime spank bank material.”

Rhys glared. Jack laughed.

“In the meantime…” Jack said, dropping his hands to squeeze Rhys’ ass and making him jump.

“We aren’t having sex in your office,” Rhys said.

“Why not?” Jack asked, baffled. “You’re telling me this doesn’t do it for you?” He gestured around the massive room. “Not at all?”

“Anyone could walk in! And there’s a photo of your child sitting right there!” Rhys said, stabbing a finger in the direction of the frame on Jack’s desk.

Angel’s joyful, innocent face smiled back at them.

“Eh, she’s seen worse,” Jack said. At Rhys’ look, he hastened to add, “I can turn it around if it bothers you that much, geeze! You’re so touchy today!”

“Not in your office,” Rhys said firmly. He leaned forward and kissed Jack on the temple, right next to the clasp of his mask. Quietly, he added, “But you know where to find me.”

Jack grumbled but let him go. Rhys stood up and backed away a few steps, then turned and began descending the stairs.

“You gonna be up in the penthouse?” Jack asked after a beat. “Waiting for me?”

Rhys looked back over his shoulder.

“Waiting?” he asked. “I guess that depends on how bored I get.”

When he passed through the reception area on his way out, Meg was typing frantically at her keypad with one hand, the other pressed to her headset as she spoke in a high, wavering voice.

“– can’t reschedule, it’s already – yes, sir – sorry, sir – of course, but –”

That made up for things quite a bit. And, really, life was all about the small victories, wasn’t it?

* 

Whatever Jack had tried to reschedule had obviously been impossible to move, because it was a long time before Rhys heard the rattle of the handle on the front door. He leaned back against the floor-to-ceiling window in the living room and listened in amusement as the door shook in its frame. There was a pause, and then a beep, and it flung open, banging against the wall. He laughed quietly to himself, but quickly smothered it as Jack came sweeping into the room.

“Took you long en-” Rhys started, but had to swallow the rest as Jack pressed him up against the window.

His kiss was hard and demanding. Rhys grinned into it, enjoying the urgency, the ungentleness, Jack’s thigh forcing itself between his own. He ground down on it and Jack’s whole leg twitched.

“It’s hot when you’re desperate,” Rhys said.

“’M not desperate,” Jack said and kissed him again with a level of need that really kind of betrayed him.

They kissed for a long, heavy moment, until the cold glass behind Rhys’ bare shoulders had begun to warm.

“I can’t help but notice,” Jack said, drawing away, “that you’re not wearing a whole ton right now.”

“Yeah, the arm’s only about eight pounds,” Rhys said.

Jack snapped the elastic band of Rhys’ underwear, which was actually the only thing he was wearing at the moment.

“It’s comfortable,” Rhys said.

“You’re cute when you act coy,” Jack said. “But you’re blushing.”

Rhys blushed even more.

“Friggin’ adorable,” Jack said. “God you have no idea, do you? I gotta say, it takes a lot to make me feel like a dirty old man, but this comes pretty close. Can’t say I hate it!” He leaned in close, a dangerous smirk on his face. “Sweetheart, have you ever been with a man before?”

“Oh my god, what?” Rhys said. “Jack, we had sex less than twenty-four hours ago.”

“Yeah, just go along with it,” Jack said. “Wrecking you is always fantastic but when you turn this red it really makes me want to wreck you for the first time.”

“Uh-huh,” Rhys said, unimpressed. “And in this scenario, where did I learn to deepthroat?”

Jack paused. “I hadn’t gotten that far in the storyline yet, but I promise it involved a lot of hard work and determination on your part. Also, since we’re taking the time to flesh out this universe, that centerfold I did for Guns Quarterly last year.”

“You are so full of yourself,” Rhys said. That he not only knew the photo spread that Jack was referencing but had masturbated furiously to it was information Jack could never be allowed to possess.

“You’re about to be full of me, too,” Jack said. “Don’t worry; I’ll be gentle.”

Rhys laughed. Jack kissed him on the nose and started peeling his jacket and vest off. Rhys watched him lazily, taking in the stretch of his muscles as the sweater went over his head and the light dusting of hair on Jack’s chest. He ground down Jack’s leg again, still firm and steady under him. Jack’s hands flew forward and his fingers dug into Rhys’ thighs. His eyes were dark.

He chuckled quietly and pulled his leg away. Rhys chased it with his hips, but Jack’s hand stopped him, palming him through the fabric of his underwear and lightly tracing the wet spot there with the tip of his finger.

“Eager,” Jack said.

Rhys hummed.

Jack slipped his hand into Rhys’ briefs and grasped him fully. Rhys bucked up into his grip as Jack stroked him for a moment, and then Jack’s hand slid down, toward his ass. Rhys watched his face carefully. Jack stopped short, one finger pressed against the edge of Rhys’ already slick hole.

Rhys felt like his whole body was on fire. Jack’s burning stare didn’t help.

“Did you finger yourself open for me, Rhys?” Jack asked roughly.

“Who’s to say it was for you? Maybe I just wanted to get –” He stuttered as Jack pressed two fingers gently in. “Get off,” he finished blearily.

“And did you?” Jack asked, scissoring with aching slowness. “Did you come while thinking about my dick? About how hard I was going to fuck you later? Or did you save it all up for me?”

“It’s always about you, isn’t it?” Rhys panted.

“That’s not an answer.”

Rhys squirmed and tried to push himself further down on Jack’s hand, but Jack pulled away slightly.

“ _Ah_ ta ta ta,” he said. “Come on, babe. Just tell me what you thought about when you touched yourself.”

Rhys groaned and let his head fall back against the window. Finally, he mumbled, “…thought about you fucking me in your office chair.”

“I knew it!” Jack crowed. “No one can resist the throne.”

“Shut _up_ ,” Rhys whined. “Just get on with it!”

“Ha ha, yeah,” Jack said, still beaming in triumph. “Where’s the lube?”

“Coffee table.”

Jack eased his fingers out. Rhys groaned at the loss but watched silently as Jack grabbed the bottle and kicked his pants and shoes off.

“Turn around,” Jack said.

Rhys turned and rested his elbows against the glass, craning his neck to look back over his shoulder. Jack tugged Rhys’ underwear down to his knees. Rhys kicked it the rest of the way off as Jack rubbed lube on his dick, working himself idly as his eyes roamed over Rhys, spread out before him. Goosebumps raised along Rhys’ skin in every place his gaze touched. Then Jack leaned in close and his dick was sliding against the cleft of Rhys’ ass. He held it there, rutting against him, occasionally rubbing across Rhys’ exposed entrance but never concentrating on it, and Rhys let his face fall forward. He could see his reflection faintly in the glass, looking as hazy with want as he felt.

The tip of Jack’s dick slid across Rhys’ hole and stopped there.

“Jack,” Rhys’ mouth said without his permission. He bit down on his tongue to keep himself from begging.

Jack made a sound, a quiet, knowing, “heh,” as though Rhys had begged him anyway. Maybe he had, for all that he’d said nothing. Then Jack was pushing in and Rhys’ grip on his tongue was broken by the moan that spilled out of him. His breath fogged the glass, obscuring the expression reflected back at him, which was maybe for the best.

Jack’s chest pressed up against Rhys’ back as he slowly bottomed out, his chin resting on Rhys’ shoulder.

“Is this how you pictured it, when you were playing with yourself?” he asked quietly. “Just like this? You’re clenching down on me pretty hard, so it must be close.”

“ _Ngh_.”

“Or is it better?” Jack went on. “Am I better than you dreamed? Tell me what you think, Rhys. C’mon.”

Rhys turned his face and kissed him.

Jack thrust shallowly, slowly as their lips locked for a moment, and then drew back, hitched a hand under one of Rhys’ knee to raise his leg, and fucked up into him hard. Rhys’ other knee wavered. He fell forward completely against the window, putting his weight against it, his flesh arm sliding slightly with every thrust that rattled through his body.

He slid a little too far and Jack’s arm suddenly wrapped around Rhys’ waist and pulled him back away from the glass. Jack kissed his neck, then turned and pointed Rhys toward the side of the couch beside them.

“Let me tell you something, babe,” Jack said.

“Let you?” Rhys asked, catching himself on the couch’s arm at a weak, diagonal angle. “I can’t get you to shut up.”

Jack pulled out almost all the way and then slammed in again, rocking Rhys forward with a cry.

“Let me tell you something,” Jack repeated. “I’ve thought about it, too. Fucking you in my chair. Fucking you over my desk. You on your knees, sucking me off while I work.” Each statement was punctuated with a heavy thrust that felt like it was knocking Rhys’ heart loose in his rib cage. “I’ve thought about it a lot. And I’ve touched myself while doing it.”

Rhys whimpered and lost his grip on the couch, falling forward onto his forearms on the carpeted floor. Jack followed, an unrelenting presence over and inside him, hard and hot, hips rolling roughly against Rhys’ ass and thighs. One of his hands tangled in Rhys’ hair and pulled his head back slightly.

“And you know what, Rhys?” he went on. “Nothing I imagined could compare to this.”

“Fuck,” Rhys breathed.

Jack laughed.

“There’s nothing in the universe that feels as good as being buried deep inside of you,” he said. “I think you know what I mean. I think you can shove as many of those little fingers in yourself as you want, but it’ll never be enough, not anymore.”

He brought one knee up and shifted his angle. His next rough thrust drove deep, straight into Rhys’ prostate. Rhys gasped and his whole body tightened at the sudden, intense pleasure.

“Nothing will ever be as good as me,” Jack said.

“Are you done?” Rhys asked, trying for exasperated, but really only managing tortured.

“Why?” Jack asked. “Are you close?”

Rhys was. Jack wasn’t done.

“You gonna come from my cock, sweetheart?” he asked. “Just from this? Without me even touching you?”

“I can’t,” Rhys said.

“Yeah, you can,” Jack said. “This is all you need. Here, let me help.”

He found the right angle again and ground down. Rhys shouted out as Jack thrust with purpose against his prostate, fingers pressing bruises into Rhys’ hips. Jack leaned forward all the way, covering Rhys completely, and gently bit the shell of his ear.

Rhys cursed loudly as he came.

“Hey, Rhys,” Jack said into his ear, still slowly rolling his hips. “Can I come in you?”

Rhys shuddered and blinked the spots out of his eyes, trying to center himself in his body again. “I just took a shower,” he said weakly.

“Is that a no?”

Rhys screwed his eyes shut and pressed his forehead to the carpet. Jack kissed his shoulders, opening his mouth and sliding his tongue wetly against the nape of Rhys’ neck. His fingers tightened on Rhys’ hips.

“Okay,” Rhys said. “Okay, you can come in me.”

“What was that?” Jack asked, even as he straightened up.

“Come in me!” Rhys snapped.

“Your wish is my command,” Jack said.

He increased his pace and reached forward with one hand to scrape his fingers down Rhys’ back. Overstimulated, heart racing, Rhys craned his neck back and saw Jack staring down at him, mouth parted slightly, face tight, the skin around his mask flushed pink. A strand of his hair had fallen loose into his eyes. He looked a little wrecked himself.

“Come on, Jack,” Rhys said, suddenly thrilled with his power. “Come in me.”

Jack grunted, faltered, and came hard. Rhys groaned, enjoying the hot, slick sensation, even knowing it would be a pain to deal with later on. Jack slid out of him and cum trickled down his thighs.

Rhys collapsed onto the carpet with a sigh. It was disturbingly comfortable for a floor covering. Also, a little wet now.

“I got cum on the carpet,” Rhys said, rolling out of the wet spot onto his back. “Sorry.”

“Cleaning bot will get it,” Jack said dismissively. “Hang on while I grab a rag.”

He stood up and padded into the bathroom and returned a minute later with a wet washcloth. Rhys reached for it but Jack batted his hand away and sank down to wipe his cum off the inside of Rhys’ thighs. Rhys was still getting used to that – the unexpected bursts of softness Jack would sometimes display. It always made his skin hum greedily for more.

Jack gently pushed one of Rhys’ legs up and dabbed at the mess he’d made of them both. Rhys watched him through half-lidded eyes.

“You’re all boneless,” Jack said. “That good for you?”

“It was pretty good,” Rhys admitted.

He’d probably be having dreams about Jack rasping in his ear for a while. But Jack likely already knew that, and if he didn’t, then there was no point in telling him and letting it go to his head.

Jack tossed the dirty cloth over his shoulder toward a corner, which was less soft, but not surprising, and collapsed onto the carpet next to Rhys.

“Told you I’d make your first time special,” he said with a wink.

“Holy shit,” Rhys groused loudly. “What is it _with_ your obsession with my virginity?”

“Ugh, I just keep imagining you, all wide-eyed and innocent and blushing and it’s just so friggin’ cute,” Jack said. “And then I realize some guy other than me tapped that and I lose my goddamn mind. It makes me wanna rip the asshole’s lungs straight out of his chest.”

Rhys ignored Jack’s assumption that he’d lost his virginity to a man – it had been a girl his age who was just as nervous and inexperienced as he was – in favor of saying, “It’s funny you should mention that, because he actually was an asshole.” Jack looked like he was about to get indignant on Rhys’ behalf (kind of sweet!) so he quickly continued, “In fact, he looked a lot like you, and when we were done, he said, ‘Sorry, babe, but I’ve gotta get back to my time machine,’ and –”

Rhys yelped as a pillow from the couch struck him full in the face.

“By now you should really know better than to give me ideas,” Jack said.

Rhys sat up and whapped him back with the same pillow. Jack grabbed it, tossed it aside, and threw himself at Rhys, who shrieked in surprise and laughed as he was wrestled down to the floor.

They tussled for a few moments, Rhys kicking and flailing as Jack wrapped his arms tightly around Rhys’ middle and squeezed, playfully biting at his chest. Finally, Rhys thumped Jack heavily on the back and yelled, “I give! I give!”

Jack eased up, but didn’t release him entirely, propping himself up so that his elbows bracketed Rhys’ head. Rhys looked up at Jack, sated and humming with contentment, and wished that they could stay like that forever. Just the two of them, with nothing and nobody to intrude.

“You didn’t win, this is an armistice,” Rhys said.

“Pft,” Jack said, rolling his eyes and laughing. “Whatever lets you sleep at night.”

Then Jack trailed off into quiet and a pensive air fell over him. He was examining Rhys’ face in that thoughtful way he sometimes did, the one that made Rhys wonder what it was exactly he was seeing. Whatever it was, Jack never said, but he looked with a calculated kind of greed – a curious gluttony. Rhys stared back steadily and let him.

“I’d kill for you,” Jack said after a moment, voice low.

It was almost apropos of nothing, except that it really, really wasn’t. There was something in the way he said it, too, a definitiveness to his voice, a steely flint to his eyes, as though he was imagining it clearly in his mind – someone trying to fuck with Rhys and Jack doing something about it. Something pitiless and horrific and sublime.

Rhys shivered as he imagined it as well, from fear or comfort he didn’t know. But.

“You like killing,” he said. “What would you do if I asked you not to kill somebody?”

Jack frowned.

“Idiot,” he said roughly. “You already know the answer to that.”

Rhys blinked, and then melted. He reached up and wrapped his arms around Jack’s neck. Whatever annoyance was left over from earlier felt like it was abruptly draining away. It didn’t matter.

“Yeah,” he said. “I know. Sorry.”

Jack lowered his face until his forehead was resting against Rhys’. “What do you have to be sorry for?”

“I don’t know,” Rhys mumbled. “Doubting you, I guess.”

“Hey, you can’t be perfect,” Jack said. “If you were, then you’d be me. Then this would be weird.”

“Yeah right,” Rhys huffed. “That’s your biggest fantasy.”

“Clearly you haven’t been paying attention,” Jack said. “I’ll forgive the confusion, because you were a little out of it just now, and because my biggest fantasy _is_ visually pretty similar, but it’s important to note that you’re also there.” He paused. “And you’re a virgin.”

“Shut up,” Rhys said with a laugh. “I can barely handle one of you, as it is.”

Jack waggled his eyebrows. Rhys rolled his eyes.

They kissed for a long time after. 

* 

Although Rhys had resolved to forget and forgive the media blackout on his relationship with Jack, walking the station anonymously was still unsettling. Now that he had realized what was happening, he couldn’t go back to ignoring it. Everywhere he went, Jack’s face stared down at him. And the people all around him stared up. How odd it was, to feel that gaze like it belonged to nobody else, and at the same time have nobody else's gaze.

The starkness of it seemed to throw his loneliness into sudden relief. Rhys tried to force it back down, feeling vaguely guilty, in the face of his own sickening happiness, for being discontent. He closed his fist around it and shoved his hands in his pockets and tried to keep it there, as though smothering it would make it go away. It itched at his palm.

Jack was his universe. Usually, that universe was massive and all-consuming. At other times, it was painfully small.

His palm itched in particular one morning a few days later when he woke up to find Jack already gone, the warmth of him almost faded entirely from the sheets. His palm itched and then his arm itched and then his whole body itched and he thought if he stayed in the penthouse for another moment, he’d go mad. He couldn’t take it anymore.

Foregoing his usual morning routine, he slipped on one of Jack’s Hyperion yellow sweaters and headed down to the Hub of Heroism, a vague plan forming in his mind. He’d get a cup of overpriced coffee and he’d go hang out in the cafeteria and he’d find someone who didn’t look too asshole-ish and he’d strike up a conversation. That was how people made friends, right? Small talk. Rhys could do that.

And, if not, he could always find a way to slip into R&D and hunt down Benson. They were sort of friends! Even though they hadn’t seen each other in weeks and the last time they’d talked had been Benson messaging him, “You’re not dead???” and Rhys responding “nope lol,” and then Benson never replying. They’d run for their lives together, once, though. That had to count for something.

Rhys crossed the hub to one of the many coffee shops, decorated in a shade of green that clashed pretty badly with the rest of the station’s color scheme. It must have been good, though, because there was a fairly long line of customers waiting to give their order. Rhys got in it.

He pulled out the shiny, platinum limitless credit chip Jack had given him, the all access pass to anything money could buy, and compared it to his ID card. One looked distinctly better than the other. The ID card was still the same temporary pass he’d been issued when he first arrived on Helios, although the clearances on it now encompassed Jack’s penthouse and office. It was still totally empty of credits, though. His own nervous face gave him a forced smile.

 _Oh, buddy,_ Rhys thought. _You have no idea._ He squinted down at it a little more. _I should really retake this photo._

“Next!” the barista called.

Rhys looked up and took a step toward the open counter before him, only to be abruptly cut off as a man in a dark suit, with dark, slicked back hair slid in front of him.

“Uh, hey, there’s a line,” Rhys said, annoyed.

The guy turned. He had thick eyebrows, a full beard and mustache, and an air of smug superiority that seemed to hover around him like a visible aura. He looked down his nose at Rhys as though Rhys was the one inconveniencing him. Then his gaze fell to Rhys’ ID card, still in one hand, hopped over to linger on the credit chip in the other, and finally gave the rest of him a condescending once over.

“Sorry,” the man drawled, not sounding even a little bit sincere. “Hugo Vasquez, Senior Manager for Security Technologies. And you are?”

“…Rhys,” Rhys bit out.

“And what do you do here at Helios, Reese?” Vasquez asked, as though indulging a child.

“…It’s pronounced ‘Rhys’ and,” Rhys paused, already hearing how it sounded in his head and not liking it. He forced himself to grit out, “…I’m between jobs at the moment.”

“Yeeeahhhhh,” Vasquez said with an upward curl of his lips. “My time? Way more valuable than yours. So, if you’ll excuse me, ‘ _Rhys_ , Vice President of Being Unemployed,’ Daddy has a date with an iced macchiato. In the meantime, try to get whatever chump you’re mooching off of to buy you a modicum of self-worth. Ciao.”

He turned back around and began giving the barista his order, leaving Rhys gaping like a fish. He looked over his shoulder at the woman standing in line behind him in search of support. She quickly glanced away, avoiding eye contact. He looked forward again. The barista appeared totally apathetic as he scribbled something on an enormous cup and took Vasquez’s ID card. There would be no recourse coming from him.

The shell-shock turned into indignation as Vasquez walked toward the other end of the counter and Rhys was finally allowed to approach the register. Indignation turned to righteous anger as he stood waiting for his drink and watched Vasquez swan off with his huge, overloaded coffee, a swirl of whipped cream and caramel drizzle on top. As Vasquez left the coffee shop, he glanced back at Rhys and, as if to really bring home how far beneath him he thought Rhys was, gave him an exaggerated wink and a finger gun salute. One of his pinkies was made of metal.

Rhys could not have been more infuriated if Vasquez had actually shot him.

Oh, that was it. Every part of Rhys was bristling with rage and humiliation. Clearly something would have to be done. There was only one thing for it.

Rhys barely tasted his latte as he stormed back toward the penthouse, already on the warpath. Vasquez had no idea the world of hurt that was about to descend on his greasy, smarmy head. He saw it laid out before him, the masterpiece of his vengeance.

As he walked, his anger forged itself into determination. Now that he was thinking about it, this would be like killing two birds with one stone. Both Vasquez and the rest of it. It would be easy.

All Rhys had to do was get a job.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> around 5 chapters this time, i think, although i'm not totally sure. updates will be further apart due to real life constraints.
> 
> i really wanted to say thank you to everyone who has supported me and who enjoyed Only Fools. your love and kindness have been really meaningful to me, on a deep, personal level. i hope you will enjoy Macaroni, too! also, a special thank you to [[@srahhh]](https://twitter.com/srahhh) and [[@everkinged]](https://twitter.com/everkinged) for helping me with this chapter. <3
> 
> you can find me on twitter at [[@ineffmoth]](https://twitter.com/ineffmoth)
> 
> please let me know what you think! i really love and appreciate any form of feedback you can give me.


	2. Chapter 2

Rhys tapped his flesh finger on the desk as he waited for his call to be picked up. He’d had to get past a secretary first, which had been fairly easy, but now he was stuck listening to Tediore’s jaunty hold music.

“ _When cash is tight, but you have to fight_ ,” a chorus of joyful voices harmonized, “ _who should you trust to save your life? Tediore!_ ”

Rhys’ finger bounced along to the beat. It was kind of catchy.

 _When you shoot our guns, watch out for your thumbs_ , he sang in his head,  _because there’s a chance they might explode! Tediore!_

He’d have to workshop it.

The line clicked through and Rhys sat up straighter as the holographic image of his former boss snapped into focus.

“Mr. Lewin, hi!” Rhys said with a great deal of forced cheerfulness. “How are you? It’s me, Rhys. I used to work under you in server maintenance. You might remember me because –”

“ _Rhys?_ ” Mr. Lewin said in disbelief, eyes wide and nervous. He looked around and then leaned in close to the screen, face growing larger in Rhys’ palm display. “Why the hell are you calling me?”

“Uh, so, as you may be aware, I recently left Tediore’s employ,” Rhys said. “And – it’s kind of funny, actually, just one of those unexpected twists in life, I guess, what can you do, am I right? But it turns out that I’m now applying for a job at Hyperion! Wow!”

Mr. Lewin stared back at him.

Rhys cleared his throat and soldiered on. “Anyway, the reason I’m calling is because I was wondering if it would be alright if I listed you as a reference on my resume?” He plastered on his most charming smile.

The line went abruptly dead as Mr. Lewin hung up.

Rhys sighed and closed his fist, exiting the display.

The problem with putting a resume together, he thought morosely, was that it became a bit difficult when you had essentially double-crossed your most recent employer. Sure, if you had murdered someone, you could scrape by just fine – at Hyperion it was probably considered a bonus – but it was a bit harder to explain why the most impressive bullet point in your work experience would like to put a bullet in you.

Rhys clicked his pen and crossed out ‘Tediore’ on the pad of paper in front of him. He jotted down a new heading and underlined it: ‘How to spin a two-year employment gap.’ Tapping the pen against his lip, he considered his options.

‘Lost the arm,’ he wrote, then immediately crossed it off. The number of medical documents he’d have to forge to make that one pass muster was nightmarish to even consider.

‘Grandmother died,’ he wrote.

That had merits. Death certificates were pretty easy to fake these days, because everybody was dying all the time. Nobody even looked at them twice. Two years, though?

He hesitated, then wrote, ‘Two grandmothers died.’

He scribbled out both ideas. Too far-fetched.

‘Witnessed a high-profile assassination on Eden-1 and had to go undercover as a cabana boy on an interstellar cruise ship to avoid being hunted down by the evil cult that arranged it,’ he wrote.

“That’s just a plot point from  _As Promethea Burns_ ,” he muttered to himself, and crossed it out as well.

‘Doing volunteer work,’ he finally tried.

Rhys groaned loudly. That was the most unbelievable one of all.

He ripped the page off the pad, crumpled it up, and tossed it at the huge Opportunity poster hanging on the wall of Jack’s study. The ball of paper bounced off the glowing Eye of Helios, knocked against the rim of the nearby trashcan, and landed inside.

Rhys fist-pumped and spun his chair. When he circled back around to face the door, Jack was leaning against the frame, watching in amusement.

“Nice basket,” he said. “If you could refrain from scuffing up my space station, though, I’d appreciate it.”

“Get a poster of yourself and I’ll bounce it off your face instead,” Rhys offered.

“Nah, it’s the crotch or nothing,” Jack said, straightening up and uncrossing his arms. “Although it’s such a large target, that might be making it too easy.”

Rhys tore off another page, wadded it up, and lobbed it at him. Jack caught it easily and swiveled. He bent his knees, lined up his shot, and made a calculated free throw. The paper ball sank smoothly into the trashcan.

Suddenly, the lights in the study flashed bright yellow and white. A buzzer sounded and a recording of a crowd cheering started to play. Jack put a hand to his ear and mouthed silently along to the chanted, “Jack! Jack! Jack! Jack!”

“Oh, come on,” Rhys complained. “Why does it do it for you and not me?”

“Nothing but net, baby,” Jack said. “ _Swish!_  What are you up to in here, anyway?”

Rhys faltered and glanced back at the scattered mess that was his resume. He wasn’t sure what Jack would think of all this, but had a feeling it would be something between the two extremes of ‘disapproval’ and ‘mockery.’

“Me? Nothing,” he said. “Just, you know.” He fiddled with one corner of the pad of paper. “Hey, so I’ve been thinking...”

“Heeeere we go,” Jack said.

“I want to go back to work,” Rhys said.

Jack waited.

“That’s all?” he said after a second.

“Yeah that’s – what, that’s all you have to say about it?” Rhys said.

“I mean, I figured you’d get bored eventually,” Jack said. “You can only masturbate so much before the shine wears off. What department are you thinking?”

“Programming." 

“Sure, I’ll call up the vice president first thing tomorrow,” Jack said. “Get you an office with a view. And a nice, big desk for us to have ‘executive conferences’ on. I know you said  _my_  office is off-limits but –”

“Whoa, hang on, no,” Rhys said. “I don’t want you to get me a job. I want to apply for one.”

Jack stared at him for a moment, and then burst out laughing. ‘Mockery’ had apparently been the correct guess.

“Stop laughing,” Rhys snapped.

“Oh – oh, you’re serious,” Jack said, wiping fake tears from his eyes. “You really mean that.”

“Yes!”

“ _Why?_ ”

“It’s complicated,” Rhys said. “I just…feel like I need to prove to myself –”  _And Hugo Vasquez, Senior Manager for Security Technologies,_  he silently added. “– that I can be successful.”

“You can,” Jack said slowly. “Because I’m giving you success. Ta-dah! You did it! And the crowd goes wild!” He cupped his hands in front of his mouth and whisper-shouted, “Rhys! Rhys! Rhys! Rhys!”

“That doesn’t count,” Rhys said. “It’s cheating.”

“There’s no such thing as cheating when  _you_  make the rules.” Jack was beginning to look exasperated.

“I don’t make the rules, though, you do!” Rhys was beginning to feel exasperated himself. “I just want to do things my way, okay?”

“But your way is stupid!” Jack said. “I hate your way! Everybody in the universe who has to do it your way hates your way.  _You’re_  going to hate your way. You  _already_  hated your way, when you had to do it before!”

Rhys pinched the bridge of his nose. It wasn’t that Jack was wrong, exactly, but he also didn’t have the full story. Not that Rhys planned on giving it to him.

“Look,” he said, “it’s not going to be like that this time. I’m applying for a better job and I have a plan.”

 _To fast track myself into position as Hugo Vasquez’s boss and make him miserable for the rest of his working life_ , was the silent addendum.

“And you know what I really hated?” Rhys continued. “Everyone thinking I didn’t deserve my job and that I’d be fired if I wasn’t sleeping with you. This time, if people hate me, I want it to be because of legitimate reasons, like my personality, or because I’m more attractive than them, not because they think I had sex with someone to get my job. Which is exactly how it’s going to look if I suddenly have an office with a view out of absolutely nowhere. Please tell me you’re following what I’m saying, here.”

Jack threw his hands up.

“What is the point,” he wanted to know, dangerously close to whining, “of sleeping with the CEO of the biggest megacorporation in the universe if you  _don’t_  get a nice job and a fat paycheck out of it?”

Rhys grinned and said, “I already get a nice job and a fat paycheck out of you.”

Jack paused.

“Okay, props where props are due,” he said. “That one was pretty good.”

“Thank you,” Rhys said primly. 

“Totally missing the point, but a solid response and delivery, and you know how I feel about style,” Jack said.

“I’m not missing the point, that’s the joke,” Rhys said.

“Okay, okay, I get it,” Jack said, smiling. “Cut it out, you’re giving me dick joke envy. What’s this job you’re applying for anyway?”

“There’s a managerial position in the security division of Programming that just opened up,” Rhys said. “A guy got caught running a racket where he made the employees pay him to get their break time? And then one of them killed him? The details weren’t totally clear.”

“Oh yeah, I remember that,” Jack chuckled. “She used a paperweight in the shape of a rakk hive. Messy.”

“Right, well, I figure after that pretty much anyone would be an improvement,” Rhys said. “And I think I’d do a good job!”

Jack looked skeptical.

“Managerial, though, Rhys?” Jack said. “Do you even have any experience in management?”

“It’s not about having experience,” Rhys said, as if explaining to a child. “It’s about knowing how to sell your strengths and make your weaknesses look like positives. It’s all about crafting the perfect resume!”

“Ooookay,” Jack said. “Well, if you and your perfect resume want a nudge –”

“No!” Rhys said, standing up. “I don’t need your help. I already said I can take care of myself.”

Jack blinked and drew back in bewilderment.

“And I said I know that,” he said.

“Okay, then!” Rhys said, walking toward the doorway. “So don’t!”

“Okay!” Jack said back.

They stood chest to chest for a moment, eyeing each other.

“…But if you change your mind…”

Rhys let out a wordless sound of frustration and pushed past him, down the hall.

“I won’t change my mind,” he said as he went. “Everything is going to go exactly to plan. I’m going to send my perfect resume in and I’m going to get an interview and they’re going to hire me.” He turned as he ducked into the kitchen and wagged a finger at Jack. “And then you’ll have to admit that I was right. Just wait.”

Jack wandered after him and watched as Rhys started to pull ingredients out of the cupboard for quesadillas. He had a look on his face as though he was watching a small animal do something particularly dumb, like walk into a door or get a box stuck on its head.

Come to think of it, he’d had that same look on his face the first time Rhys had bought groceries. It’d just been some milk and sandwich fixings, but he’d seemed totally baffled by the whole exercise.

“I can have a five-course meal brought up here faster than it takes to get the stupid plastic nub off the bread bag,” he’d said. “This is a complete waste of time.”

“Sometimes,” Rhys had said, unscrewing the lid off a jar of grape jelly, “a guy just wants to make a PB&J, Jack. Crusts or no crusts?”

Jack had been silent as Rhys carved the crusts off his triangle sandwiches, and he was silent now, as Rhys began heating oil in a pan. Judging, but silent. Rhys wondered how long that would last.

Approximately ten minutes, as it turned out.

“I’m gonna roast the hell out of you when this dumb job thing blows up in your face,” Jack said through a mouthful of quesadilla. “Pass the salsa.”

*

A few days after Rhys had sent in his resume, he did receive a call-in for an interview. But it wasn’t for the managerial position.

“Data mining,” he read dully, slumping forward in his seat.

Jack leaned over the back of the couch and read the ECHO display over Rhys’ shoulder.

“Surprise,” he said sarcastically. “Your last listed job experience was two years ago at some one-planet IT firm no one’s heard of before and to explain the employment gap, you said you ‘took time off to explore alternative career paths.’ That’s what someone who couldn’t get a job says, Rhys.”

Rhys groaned. 

“Big hand’s ticking toward roast-o-clock, babe,” Jack said, and then sing-songed, “Cushy, effort-free promotion is still up for grabs.”

“No, this is fine!” he said. “This is better, in fact. Yeah…because I’ll ladder climb! I’ll ladder climb so fast it’ll knock Vasquez’s socks off.”

“…Who?” Jack asked, but he had faded entirely into the background.

“The look on his face when I go from data mining to being his boss in under six months is going to be so good,” Rhys said. “And then the look on his face when I fire him will be even better!”

“Hold on, pumpkin,” Jack said, waving a hand in front of Rhys’ face to get his attention. “Who are we talking about?”

Rhys looked at him. Oh. Right.

“I’m starting to think there’s something you’re not telling me,” Jack said.

And there were good grounds for that. The crux of the issue, and the reason Jack couldn’t be allowed to interfere, was this: when it came to people like Hugo Vasquez, you had to beat them at their own game.

Jack would never understand that. Jack played all the games all the time and always, always won (except at poker, apparently). Every game was his game and the other players all subject to his whims. To Jack, Hugo Vasquez was an ant you could step on for satisfactory vengeance. For Rhys, things were different.

If Rhys wanted to crush Vasquez, he had to do it using the rules Vasquez set. Anything less would be counted as a false victory, and there Vasquez would be, still snidely mocking Rhys from under the heel of his boot. Like a cockroach, waiting for the right moment to crawl out of its hole into the light. A man like Vasquez, you had to force him to respect you. Only then could you rip his throat out.

Not literally, though! That was the other Jack problem. If it was up to him to deal with Vasquez, he’d shoot him and be done with it.

But Rhys didn’t want to kill Vasquez. The thought made his skin crawl a little. To kill a living human you had spoken to and shared breathing space with. No, Rhys just wanted to thoroughly humiliate him and maybe make him cry and quit his job and change his name and move to Hestias to become a basket weaver and eventually waste away due to a lung disease brought on by inhaling jute fibers. That’s all.

Anyway, the point was, maybe Rhys could have Jack ruin Vasquez for him, and maybe he could convince Jack not to get too violent with it, but, ultimately, when Vasquez tucked tail and ran away, it’d be from Jack, not Rhys. That wasn’t good enough. Rhys didn’t want Jack to win. Rhys wanted to win.

Jack was still waiting for a response, one eyebrow raised.

“It’s nothing,” Rhys said quickly. When the eyebrow remained raised, Rhys held up a warning hand and said, as firmly as he could, “Don’t get involved, Jack.”

“Wow, those are two totally non-contradictory statements,” Jack said. “You really have me convinced.”

“I’m telling you to stay out of it!” Rhys said. He stood up. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go strategize.”

“Christ,” Jack said as Rhys headed for the study.

Winning would apparently take a little more work than Rhys had originally anticipated. But that was okay – it really was! These sorts of setbacks happened.

“Sometimes an obstacle,” his mother had once said, right after the accident that had destroyed his arm and eye, “is just life’s way of making our inevitable victory that much more satisfying.”

The plan was still on. The finale had just been improved.

 *

Rhys’ first official day at work for Hyperion began with an orientation meeting in Human Resources*. When Rhys received the message instructing him to report there at eight in the morning, he scrolled to try to find out what the asterisk was for, but found no explanation.

“It’s a legal thing,” Jack said when Rhys asked him. “Had to put it there after people kept complaining that HR didn’t actually provide any sort of individual support. For some reason they thought it meant ‘Resources for Humans to Use’ and not ‘Humans that are Resources for Jack to Use.’” He laughed. “What a bunch of morons.”

Although it was only orientation, Rhys arrived in HR* fifteen minutes early in his best business formals. He’d bought a new tie and a swanky black Hyperion vest and his boots had been shined to maximum levels of luster. His hair was carefully swept back and he’d practiced his look of condescension in the mirror that morning.

 _Dress for the job you want_ , he told himself,  _not the one you have._

Unfortunately, the aura of HR* was such that any spark of individuality or self-assurance a person might possess was snuffed out into dull, flavorless smoke the moment they stepped off the elevator. In fact, Rhys got the impression that the entire floor may have been intentionally and maliciously designed to induce vulnerability in the weak-willed.

The interior design palette ranged from off-white to near-beige, with occasional deviances into gray. The air smelled like stale carpet and the temperature was a few degrees too cool to be comfortable, a perpetual chill that was just small enough that complaining would be petty. Overhead, the air conditioning droned eternally. This, combined with the low murmur of voices and the intermittent ringing of telephones, lulled Rhys into a state of near-complacency.

As he walked down the long, uniform aisles, Rhys passed office after office with glass doors. Inside each room were HR* employees hunched at monitors. Occasionally there were slumped individuals sitting in the chairs across from them, looking as though their life energy had been siphoned away. There was lots of poorly concealed crying. Rhys passed one office where a man was on the floor on his knees, hands clasped together as he begged like a condemned man supplicating for forgiveness. An indifferent HR* employee sat typing at his desk, the kneeling man’s pleas as inaudible to him as they were to Rhys, safely on the other side of the soundproof glass. Rhys moved on quickly.

Having now been to Jack’s office, seen the abominations of R&D’s Genetics division first hand, witnessed the secrets of the Eridian Research division, stood at the controls of the moonshot canon, and peered into the horrors of Jack’s laundry basket, Rhys felt confident in saying that HR*, above all, was the most evil place on Helios.

The HR* representative Rhys was scheduled to meet with was named Faizan, according to the metal placard on his desk. He had thick black glasses, a faint sheen of sweat on his forehead, and a glazed look in his eyes. Faizan barely acknowledge Rhys as he sank into an uncomfortable tweed office chair, except with a brief upward flick of his eyes and a decisive click of his mouse.

“Congratulations,” Faizan said in a monotone, after a pause so long that Rhys had started to become nervous, “on your exciting new career with Hyperion. Helios is thrilled to add you to our diverse and hardworking team…” Faizan paused and clicked his mouse again. “…Rhys.” He turned to look at Rhys fully for the first time. “But first, paperwork.”

Faizan twisted his monitor so that Rhys could see it. Displayed on the screen was a long readout of Rhys’ personal information, including some things that Rhys was vaguely uncomfortable to see in Hyperion’s database. Like his blood type and the status of his kidneys. He was almost certain that hadn’t been in his file when he’d arrived with Dr. Headland on behalf of Tediore, and he was positive he hadn’t had his blood drawn since then. That he knew of? There was definitely cause for concern.

“I’ll just need you to confirm the accuracy of our information to start with,” Faizan said. “Name, date of birth, planet of origin, full medical history, ECHO frequency, current address –”

He stopped short, cursor hovering over Rhys’ listed address – Helios Level 420, Suite 69.

Faizan cleared his throat. Rhys winced. Jack wasn’t subtle, was he?

“Don’t…think about it too hard,” Rhys advised.

“Sir,” Faizan said wearily, “not thinking about it too hard is my job. Please review the information listed and initial here.” He passed Rhys a tablet and a stylus.

Rhys quickly scribbled an ‘R.S.’ without bothering to actually confirm anything – it was more likely to be frightening than inaccurate – and passed it back.

“Moving on to the paperwork,” Faizan said. He opened a filing cabinet near his feet and began pulling out large paper packets, plopping them down in front of Rhys in a steadily growing tower.

Rhys watched with apprehension as the amount of paper grew, and wondered if this really couldn’t all have been done digitally. Then again, paper copies were harder to search for keywords and much easier to shred.

Once Faizan had finished, Rhys pulled the first packet down – ‘Employee Benefits’ – and flipped it open.

“Insurance: It’s not for everyone!” a cheery blurb declared.

Well, if Rhys needed any medical attention, Jack would have to foot the bill. Hopefully it would be with the smallest amount of mockery possible. But probably not.

“Read and sign those,” Faizan instructed. “Let me know if you have any questions.”

Rhys began skimming the packets, not taking much in, scribbling his name wherever it was asked for. It was tedious work. After a fair amount of this mind-numbing exercise had passed, he looked up to see what Faizan was doing, just for a change of pace. Faizan had turned back to his monitor and was typing away, periodically taking sips from a mug. On the side, in big red letters, it said, ‘You don’t have to be a sociopath to work here, but it helps!’

Rhys an uncontrolled bark of laughter. Faizan started and looked at him in confusion.

“Sorry,” Rhys said. “Where’d you get that mug? My b- um, I mean, I…know someone it would be perfect for.”

Faizan stared blankly at Rhys for a moment. Then, maintaining eye contact, he dumped the remains of his coffee into a nearby trashcan and passed the now empty mug to Rhys.

“Oh, uh,” Rhys said, awkwardly. “Thanks.”

He set the mug down on the desk next to him and resumed filling out the paperwork, this time at a much more rapid pace.

When his cramped hand had scrawled out its final scribble, Faizan collected the stack of paper and had him watch a short company orientation film – ‘Hyperion Company Values and You.’ It featured a crowd of attractive Hyperion employees modelling such behaviors as dressing to code and reporting coworkers for expressing what the film called ‘unapproved brand sentiments.’ Jack did not appear in person, but there was a shot of the film’s employees gazing adoringly at a large cardboard cutout of him.

“If you work hard and follow these simple rules,” the narrator said, “one day even you may find yourself in the presence of Handsome Jack.”

Rhys glanced at Faizan and accidentally made eye contact as the film ended and cut to static.

“Not much of an incentive in my case, I guess,” Rhys joked.

“Someone will be here to escort you to your new workspace shortly,” Faizan said stiffly. “Don’t forget your mug.”

Rhys spent the rest of his time in Faizan’s office waiting in awkward silence.

The woman who escorted Rhys up to the right Programming sublevel was short, plump, and intense in her examination of her new coworker. She eyed Rhys’ cybernetic arm with open interest, then his ECHOeye with bare fascination. It was hard to tell whether she was considering getting her own matching set or if she wanted to break his prosthetics open to see how they worked. Rhys inched away from her as subtly as he could, just in case.

“Your cubicle is next to mine,” she said as they exited the elevator out into data mining, eyes still tracing the curve of his metal elbow. “All the way by the bathrooms. But the boss wanted to talk to you first. His office is over there.”

She pointed and Rhys followed her finger’s trajectory back past his shoulder toward the only enclosed office in the open floor plan. The floor, he noticed, was uncomfortably similar to HR*.

“What’s the boss’s name?” he asked her. “And, uh, yours?”

When she didn’t respond, he looked back, but she had vanished. Rhys blinked at the open air in her place.

 _Weird_ , he thought. She hadn’t seemed that eager to abandon him and his arm.

Rhys crossed over to the office and raised his fist to knock, but stopped short. An inexplicable discomfort had settled on his spine. A premonition. He suddenly had a very, very bad feeling about all this. Before he could lower his hand and reassess the situation, however, the door swung open.

“Hey there, new guy,” Hugo Vasquez said with a smile like the cat who’d caught the canary. “You’re right on time.”

Rhys gaped at him, fist still hanging dumbly in the air.

“You…are…” he said slowly.

“Your boss,” Vasquez confirmed. He stepped aside and gestured for Rhys to step past him into his office. “Why don’t you come in so we can have a chat, Rhys?”

The door thudded shut behind Rhys as he entered the room, echoing the door that slammed in his head.

“Take a seat,” Vasquez said.

Rhys sank numbly into the chair in front of Vasquez’s desk, a huge slab of metal that took up most of the room. It wasn’t a large office, and there was no window, but it felt like acres compared to what Rhys had at the moment. The sociopath mug and ‘Hyperion Employee Handbook’ sitting in his lap were like lead weights. Cement shoes.

“Rhys, Rhys, Rhys, Rhys, Rhys,” Vasquez said, leaning up against the side of the desk next to him.

“That’s my name,” Rhys said. Lower, he added, “You don’t have to keep repeating it like that. In your voice.”

“Rhys,” Vasquez went on, “I have to say, I’m proud of you.”

 _Oh my god_ , Rhys thought.

“It takes guts to realize that you’ve wasted your life and decide to man up and make a change,” Vasquez said. “It takes cojones.  _Balls_.”

“I haven’t ‘wasted my life,’” Rhys said.

“I’ve seen your resume,” Vasquez chuckled. “It’s okay to admit that you couldn’t get a job for two years. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. The universe needs nobodies in it, so that those of us who mean something can be somebodies.”

Rhys clenched his fists and bit his tongue.

“When your application came through, I have to say, I was surprised,” Vasquez went on. “I didn’t think you had it in you. Being a nobody? It’s easy. Comfortable. Becoming a somebody, though, that’s hard. Real hard. What position did you originally apply for, again? Something in management, I thought.”

“…Division Four Programming Lead,” Rhys said.

“Wow, that’s like –” Vasquez laughed. “That’s nearly  _my_  boss!” He shook his head in amusement. “Cute joke, Rhys.”

He straightened up and clamped a hand down on Rhys’ shoulder, heavy and domineering. Rhys’ skin prickled underneath his clothes as he stamped down the knee-jerk urge to shake it off.

“But if you want to make it anywhere in life, you’re going to have to put the work in,” Vasquez said. “You know, I’m looking forward to watching you try. Watching you struggle to get to the top. Watching you attempt to swim against fate. The destiny of a nobody.” His smile grew tight. “And, Rhys, let me give you a free tip. From a somebody to a nobody.” He loomed close enough that Rhys could tell he plucked his nose hairs. “When you’re clawing your way up from the bottom, be careful where you step. It’s going to be hard, there’s no getting around that. But you have the power to make it much, much worse.”

Rhys glared at Vasquez and, for a brief moment, thought he understood why Jack had strangled the previous CEO of Hyperion to death. Vasquez examined him back, his smile brightening back into maximum smugness as he took in Rhys’ expression.

“It’s good to have you on my team, Rhys,” he said at last. “I can tell already you’re going to be a diligent and valuable asset.” He shook Rhys’ shoulder slightly, like a dog or a child, then let go. “No time like the present, right? Why don’t you go find Ellen and have her fill you in on the Elpis project?”

Rhys gripped his mug and handbook and stood up sharply. Back ramrod straight, he strode to the door.

“And Rhys?” Vasquez called as Rhys yanked the door open. He waited for Rhys to turn back to him, and then said, “Keep making me proud.”

It was a good thing Rhys was holding the sociopath mug in his flesh hand, because the other might have crushed it into dust. Robotically, Rhys forced himself to turn and leave, careful not to slam the door shut. He took deep, controlled breaths as he crossed the floor toward the bathrooms.

Ellen, he assumed, was the woman who had escorted him up from HR*. He found her in a cramped space that was made smaller by scattered, half-dissected robotics and a large number of messy blueprints pinned to the walls. She turned to stare at Rhys as he approached.

No, not at Rhys. At his arm again.

“Vasquez,” Rhys bit out, “wants you to explain the Elpis project to me.”

“It’s busy work,” Ellen said at once. “Scavs no longer serve a tangible risk to Hyperion properties and as such we have a limited interest in their movements and demographics. He’ll probably want you to review the material from scratch, though. For anomalies. I’ll send it to you.” She paused. “I like your arm.”

Rhys didn’t say anything to that, because if he opened his mouth, he thought he might start screaming.

His chair, barely feet away and surrounded by bare, beige walls, embraced him with eerie and repulsive familiarity. As he waited for the computer to boot up so that he could log in to the new work email Faizan had given him, Rhys looked at his reflection in the black monitor. It was nothing but an ugly, impotent smear.

Things, he admitted to himself through the pounding blood in his ears, were not going to plan.

*

Rhys headed home late that afternoon, unsure how he was going to salvage the situation. 

Quitting was not an option. That would have been as good as admitting that Vasquez had won, and there was no way Rhys would submit himself to that defeat so easily. But Vasquez was right – a victory in these circumstances was going to be very, very hard. He’d have to be smart about this, and stay on his toes. More than anything, he was going to have to rely on luck.

 _Keep your head up and wait for the moment to strike_ , he told himself.  _He’ll show a weakness eventually. Something you can use. All it takes is patience._

He wasn’t sure how patient he could be. He’d never been the kind of person who could play the long game, especially not when it meant letting his pride take a beating.

And that wasn’t to mention the other failed portion of his goal, which felt pretty juvenile in retrospect. To make friends.

Ellen’s unwavering fixation with his cybernetics and the screwdriver he’d seen her stirring her coffee with went floating through his brain. He’d attempted exactly one conversation with her, during their lunch break. They ate in the break room and had fast meals dispensed from a vending machine to cut down on travel time to the cafeteria and back.

“Why are you in data mining if you have a robotics background?” Rhys had asked her. “Did you try for something in Engineering?”

“I don’t have a robotics background,” she’d said. “I just like taking stuff apart. It’s a bad habit.” She toyed with her fork for a second, then asked, “Does your arm come off?”

“No,” Rhys had lied.

She hadn’t looked discouraged.

So, no, he wasn’t going to be making friends with the robotics version of a serial killer slash potential actual Rhys-killer. Even as a last resort.

And the other employees in data mining all avoided him like they could smell the trouble coming off of him in waves. The noticeable dip in volume to the office chatter that occurred when Vasquez had emerged from his office to do rounds in the afternoon probably had something to do with that.

Maybe Faizan would be up for after-work drinks?

As the elevator let him off in front of the penthouse’s front door, he looked down at the sociopath mug in his hand, still intact despite a day of barely contained rage, and doubted that would be the case.

“How was your first day of school?” Jack greeted him as he entered the living room. He was sprawled out on the couch, playing some ECHOsim on his handheld.

It was probably a farming RPG, judging by the cutesy, pixelated music sounds it was making. Jack secretly liked those almost as much as he liked the ones with guns and explosions. It was the patient strategy and accumulation of wealth, Rhys thought. Now there was a man who could play the long game.

“What’s your favorite class?” Jack continued. “Did you make any new friends?”

“It was fine,” Rhys lied. “You left the front door unlocked again. Here, I got you a souvenir.”

He handed the mug to Jack, whose eyes lit up as he set his handheld aside to examine it.

“Ha ha, this is great!” he said. “What if I kept it on my desk and whenever someone came to beg for their life I just picked it up and made a big show of taking a sip out of it? That’d be funny, right?” He squinted into it. “Did you already drink out of this?”

“Uh, yeah,” Rhys said, thinking of poor Faizan’s firm detachment from anything problematic. Better to leave him out of it. “First day jitters. Needed my caffeine.”

“Oh?” Jack asked. “Lots going on down in data mining?”

“No, just, you know,” Rhys said.

Jack waited for him to elaborate. Rhys shrugged.

“You’re not gonna give me anything to work with?” Jack asked. “Exciting data mining secrets? Cubicle specs? The gross cologne your boss wears?”

“Jack, it’s none of your business,” Rhys said, annoyed at the reminder of Vasquez, whose cologne really was gross. And excessively applied.

“Uhhhhh,  _excuse_  me,” Jack said. “It literally is my business, first of all. Second of all, I was just asking! This whole hidey, don’t want to talk about anything shtick is getting super old, in case you weren’t aware. What the hell are you even up to, babe? And don’t say ‘making an honest living’ because the more you do, the stupider it sounds. That’s not you. And who’s –”

“Can you drop it already?” Rhys snapped.

Jack’s eyes narrowed and his mouth curved downward into the beginning of genuine displeasure.

“Sorry,” Rhys said, looking away. “I just had a bad day and I don’t really want to talk about it.” He glanced back at Jack. He really did just want to curl up and not think for a while. “Can I…?” He extended his arms and wiggled his fingers.

Jack stared blankly at him for a beat longer, then rolled his eyes and opened his arms. Relieved, Rhys crawled into Jack’s lap.

“Oh my god this job sucks so bad,” he groaned into Jack’s lapel. “It’s the worst.”

“At the risk of sounding like a broken record,” Jack said, “which I hate, because it means someone’s not friggin’ listening to me –”

“Yeah, I know,” Rhys said. “Corner office. Big desk. If you don’t like repeating it, then stop talking for a little while.”

“Brat,” Jack said. But he wrapped his arms around Rhys and wound his fingers into the hair at the base of Rhys’ neck, tugging gently.

Rhys sighed.

“How was your day?” Rhys asked. “How’s the Anshin thing going?”

“Still thinking about that?”

“Not much time, but yeah,” Rhys said. “If you’re not after the defensive tech, then you’re probably interested in the elemental adaptation. That still leaves a lot of possibilities, though, Jack. How you expect me to guess –”

“I don’t want you to guess,” Jack said. “I want to hear what you think.”

Rhys turned his head to rest his cheek on Jack’s shoulder.

“Might be a while,” he said. “Some stuff came up.”

“I can see that,” Jack said dryly.

Rhys hummed.

Jack ran his fingers through Rhys’ hair, softly massaging the pads of his fingers into his scalp. He tilted forward slightly and pressed a kiss to the top of Rhys’ head.

“Babe,” he said into it. “Did something happen?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Jack said slowly as he pulled back again, “did somebody do something to you?”

Rhys bristled at the fact that Jack was still digging at this, then eased. He could feel the tension in Jack’s shoulder, through the side of his face.

“No,” he said. “Nothing happened, Jack.”

Jack said nothing in response.

* 

The next day, after Jack was safely gone from the penthouse, Rhys had to give himself a pep-talk in the three-paneled fitting room mirror in the walk-in closet.

“Vasquez is a slimy douchebag,” he told his reflection. “You are a super intelligent and likeable guy who has…experienced a setback. A big one. But that doesn’t matter. Because the universe is fair and the good guy always wins. So…go win!”

He straightened his tie and the cufflink on his sleeved, flesh arm, patted his pockets to make sure he had his ID card and credit chip, and kept his chin held high as he headed for the penthouse door.

Butt Stallion was hanging out in the entrance hall, nibbling on one of the giant potted ferns.

“Don’t eat that,” Rhys said, swatting at her. “It’s bad for horses.” He thought it was, anyway.

Butt Stallion snorted and jerked her head to the side to avoid his hand, still chewing on a mouthful of leafy greens.

“Okay, you can eat whatever you want forever if you give me some good luck for today,” Rhys bargained, because diamond horses could probably do that.

The chewing paused, and Butt Stallion glanced at him.

“Just a little,” Rhys said, stretching out his flesh hand. “Please.”

Butt Stallion snorted, and batted his palm gently with the front of her nose.

“Yes!” Rhys said. “Thank you, Butt Stallion! Eat as many of Jack’s ferns as you want.”

He locked the door to the penthouse with a swipe of his card and headed down to Programming, a slight skip in his step. Not even Vasquez could bring him down today, he told himself. He had Butt Stallion’s blessing. Only good things could happen.

Some other force in the universe, as equally malevolent as Butt Stallion was pure, must have been at work, however, because there was a stack of five boxes waiting on Rhys’ desk when he arrived.

“What’s all this?” he asked Ellen, leaning over the top of the cubicle to look at her.

She jumped and dropped a metal rectangle the size of a fist onto the ground.

“What’s what?” she squeaked, kicking it further under her desk with a thud.

“…The boxes on my desk,” Rhys said.

Hopefully whatever that was hadn’t been important.

“Oh,” Ellen said, sounding relieved. “I don’t know. Vasquez dropped them off a little while ago.”

Rhys groaned and turned back to the boxes. There were no notes or labels, and when he opened them up, there was a jumble of unorganized files with no indication of what they might be for. He booted up his computer and checked his email. Nothing.

“Oh my god, are you really going to make me go talk to you?” he complained.

“What’s that, Rhys?” Vasquez said from behind him.

It was Rhys’ turn to jump and swivel.

“Knock knock,” Vasquez said, rapping his fist on the wall of Rhys’ cubicle. “Just swinging by to see if you’d arrived yet.”

“I start at eight every morning,” Rhys said. “It’s seven fifty-five.”

“Early bird gets the worm, Rhys,” Vasquez said. “Never forget that.” He glanced over Rhys’ shoulder. “I see you’ve found the old Elpis files.”

“The what?” Rhys asked. He looked over at the boxes, then back at Vasquez. “No, you can’t be – these aren’t for the Elpis project, are they?”

“Yeaaahhh, all the digital copies of our data from before the Dahl occupation four years ago were corrupted or lost in said occupation,” Vasquez said. “Paper copies are all that’s left. There’s a lot of unaccounted for data in there, Rhys. Who knows what valuable information we’ve gone without? Could be groundbreaking. Could be life changing. Or it could be totally worthless. I guess you’ll find out, won’t you?” He chuckled. “When you get through those, there’s another fifteen waiting in the conference room. Ellen can show you where.”

There was another series of thuds as Ellen squeaked, “That’s me!”

Vasquez frowned in the direction of her cubicle, but then seemed to dismiss whatever it was he saw, because he refocused on Rhys.

“I have a meeting with Henderson this afternoon,” he said. “Important guy – head of Security and Propaganda. Maybe someday you’ll get to meet him. Until then, try not to make too much noise.”

He winked and clicked his tongue. Rhys watched him go and wished that he’d taken up Jack’s offer for laser vision after all.

“Fucking Vasquez,” he grumbled under his breath as he turned back to the boxes. He eyed them for a moment. “Fucking Dahl.”

He dragged the first box down and stared into it. An invoice from a shipment of cl4p-tp units stared up at him. Would anyone really notice if he dumped half of everything in here into a furnace?

Yes, his instincts told him. Vasquez would.

An hour later he was still sifting through the contents of the first box, trying to find some semblance of meaning or order to the collection of files. As far as he could tell, things had just been shoved together because they had the word ‘Elpis’ somewhere in the first page. There were census survey pages, geology sample records, medical vendor usage trends, and even several sheets stapled together that looked like someone’s unpaid (and frankly enormous) bar tab.

“Don’t forget – you still owe me,” was written at the top, next to a large, red kiss mark.

Rhys tossed it in his ‘indecipherable nonsense’ pile.

“ _Oh my god,_ what the hell is he doing here?” someone suddenly gasped from a cubicle not far away.

Rhys’ head jerked up.

“Did somebody do something?” another nearby cubicle occupant asked shrilly. “Do you think Vasquez did something?”

“God, I hope so,” a third person muttered.

Rhys froze, closed his eyes, and let his head fall forward onto his desk.

 _Please let it be Jeffrey Blake_ , he silently wished.  _Butt Stallion, come through for me, girl. Ferns. Think of all the tasty ferns._

He clenched the hand she had headbutted that morning into a fist and tried to feel the tingle of magic within it.

“Whoa-ho- _ho_!” Jack’s unmistakable voice rang out across the top of the cubicles. “Look at you sad shmucks. Wow, it’s boring down here, isn’t it? I’ve been here two minutes and I already want to leave. Yawn!” He laughed. It was his obnoxious laugh.

When he finally trailed off, you could’ve heard a pin drop up in the hub.

 _Jack, you complete bastard_ , Rhys thought. Then,  _Butt Stallion, you’re a fraud._

“Don’t mind me,” Jack said. “Just go about your business. Keep on…clicking those little mice of yours. Mice? Is it mice? Mouses? Mouse-i? Anybody know?”

Rhys turned and looked behind him at the bathroom doors. They weren’t that far away – he was painfully aware of that fact. People had been going in and out all morning, flushing toilets and running faucets. He now knew just how small a portion of his coworkers washed their hands after doing business.

Silently, he slid out of his chair and crouched low, making a break for the men’s room. There was, immediately, a low, loud whistle.

“And where do you think you’re going?” Jack said, coming down the aisle straight toward him. “Not slacking off on company time are you, young man?”

Rhys straightened up and glared at him.

“I have to use the bathroom,” he said. He glanced over and saw a dozen faces staring at him from open cubicle doorways and over wall divides. “Sir,” he added, with tremendous effort.

Jack’s grin was predatory.

“Sure, I get it,” he said, slinging an arm around Rhys’ shoulders. “Too nervous to meet your hero. I know how it is. But don’t worry, kiddo, it’s endearing.” He lowered his voice and whispered in Rhys’ ear. “I’m really digging this roleplay thing, by the way.”

“What the fuck are you doing here, Jack?” Rhys hissed back.

“Well, there’s this guy I’m kind of fond of,” Jack said, “and lately he’s been acting all upset, but he won’t tell me why. So I decided to launch an internal investigation.”

“I told you to stay out of it!” Rhys said.

There was a clattering sound. Rhys looked around and met Ellen’s wide, terrified gaze from mere feet away. The metal box was on the floor again. Rhys smiled weakly at her, but her expression didn’t change.

“And I’m ignoring that because it pissed me off!” Jack said. In a louder voice he said, “Alright, this has been real cute, always nice to meet a fan, but, hey, who the hell’s in charge around here? Am I right?”

As one, the observing faces all turned to look at Vasquez’s office. Jack’s gaze followed them.

“Ooh,” he said. “That’s an answer.”

His arm dropped from around Rhys’ shoulders and he started forward. At the same time, the door swung open, and Vasquez stepped out, straightening his tie and humming slightly. He stopped in the doorway like a deer in the headlights as he saw Jack standing across the room.

A phone rang in one of the cubicles, then cut off suddenly, as if someone had unplugged it.

“H-Handsome Jack,” Vasquez croaked. “Sir! What are you – why do we have the honor of –”

“Yeah, okay, it’s less cute when you do it,” Jack said. “Surprise inspection! New thing I’m trying out. You the boss of these nerds?”

“Yes, sir,” Vasquez said. “Hugo Vasquez, Senior Manager for Security Technologies.”

It sounded way stupider when he said it to Jack, Rhys noticed.

“Actually, I used to –” Vasquez started, but was interrupted.

“Vasquez,” Jack said, giving Rhys a sly glance. “Vasquez, Vasquez, Vasssssquez. You know, I think someone mentioned that name to me recently.”

Vasquez looked like he was about to wet his pants with joy. The glare Rhys leveled at Jack would have murdered a lesser man.

“Who was it?” Jack said to himself, brow scrunched comically. “Gosh, I just can’t remember…” He tapped his finger against his chin, then gave an exaggerated shrug. “Ah, well. Guess it wasn’t important. You know what is important, though? Whatever dumb thing you do down here!”

“Data mining and analysis, sir,” Vasquez said. “With a focus in security.”

“Data mining!” Jack laughed. “Right! Super – super important! Like, for example, what’s this guy up to?” He jerked his thumb in Rhys’ direction.

“He just started yesterday,” Vasquez said.

“And what do you have him doing?”

Vasquez hesitated. “He’s…familiarizing himself with old data sets in order to acclimate to the system.”

“Like?” Jack prompted.

“Elpis,” Rhys said, growing tired of the dramatics. “I’m looking at Elpis files from four years ago.”

Jack looked at Rhys. Then he looked at Vasquez. Then he looked at Rhys again.

“Elpis!” he said. “From four years ago!” With that, he started laughing.

Rhys looked at the ceiling.

“Holy crap, no one gives a shit about Elpis!” Jack cried. “And all those – all those files have to be – oh, oh my god, this I have to see!” He waved a hand at Rhys. “Lead the way, sweetheart.”

Rhys pointed toward his cubicle. Jack eagerly ducked into it and stood staring at the boxes in pure delight. Rhys followed after him, as if his presence could at all mitigate the damage.

“You’re in data mining!” Jack cackled. “Looking at garbage reports on moon rocks! That are on paper!” He picked up the relevant file and waved it in Rhys’ face.

“I sure am, sir,” Rhys said through gritted teeth.

Jack’s laughter renewed, with strength.

“This is – this is – oh god!” he said. He started sucking in air between loud, barking peals and wrapped an arm around his stomach as he howled, as if physically pained by mirth.

At some point, it was a bit much, even for Jack.

“Okay,” Jack said. “Okay – hah, I’m taking deep breaths.  _Hoo._ ” He paused, and picked up the bar tab from the nonsense pile. “How’d this get in here?”

“The Elpis project might seem like a waste of time at first glance,” Vasquez said, apparently feeling the need to defend himself, “but there’s actually a lot we can learn from –”

“No there’s not, but whatever,” Jack said, pocketing the bar tab. “This is objectively hilarious. I’m gonna be laughing at this for days.”

He turned and locked eyes with Rhys, who did his best to silently convey just how badly he wanted to throttle Jack in that moment. It was ‘very badly.’

“Or, like, a few hours,” Jack amended. He scratched his nose and glanced away.

 _Yeah, that’s right_ , Rhys thought, eyes narrowing.  _You are so fucking in it right now._

Jack cleared his throat and turned back to Vasquez. “Anyway, enough about this guy, nice as he is to look at. Let’s talk about you, Assquez. I want to know all about the man, the myth, the legend, the olfactory experience.”

There was a choked, poorly stifled laugh from a nearby cubicle. Safely hidden by the walls of his own cubicle, Rhys kicked Jack in the ankle.

“Well, sir, I’m currently heading an eridium mining deal down on Pandora,” Vasquez said eagerly. “Using the data we gather here to maneuver –”

“Cool, I love eridium, that’s really neat, I’m thrilled,” Jack said. “What have you been up to, say, for the last five days of your life? In detail. Go anywhere fun? Meet anyone new? Do anything you shouldn’t have?”

Rhys kicked Jack in the ankle again, harder this time. Jack kicked him back.

“Uh, I’m not sure what exactly…” Vasquez said, baffled. “…I bought a Pangolin brand garment steamer? Hyperion doesn’t make a portable unit. I’ll…return it if you want, sir.”

Jack examined him for a moment, then looked at Rhys. Rhys raised his eyebrows and made a silent face that he hoped clearly conveyed, “See there is absolutely nothing going on and you have wasted everyone’s time coming down here now leave immediately at once.” Jack rolled his eyes.

“I kind of want to shoot you right now,” he said to Vasquez. “That seems simplest.”

“I’ll return it!” Vasquez yelped. “Right away!”

“Jack, I swear to god,” Rhys said out of the corner of his mouth, trying not to move his lips.

“But!” Jack said. “Surprise inspections are for research purposes only. Surprise firings happen later. Or sooner! Depends on what the data tells me. You guys know all about that, I’m sure.”

He thumped Rhys heartily on the back.

"Yes, sir," Vasquez said. "Of course, sir."

“In the meantime, keep your noses to the grindstone, kiddos,” Jack said. “I’ve really got my eye on this department. I am – _ha ha_ – watching it. Like a hawk.” His easy smile slipped and his voice dropped a notch. “You have my absolute attention.”

Vasquez looked like he couldn’t figure out whether this was a good or a bad thing. He nodded quickly.

“Alright, well, I’ve got places to go, people to kill,” Jack said, smile returning. “Other people. For now.” He glanced at Rhys. “Good luck with that Elpis thing, cupcake.”

With one last pat on Rhys’ back, hand lingering as it slid down his side, Jack exited the cubicle and headed down the hall. Rhys stepped out to watch him go, arms crossed. When he made it to the elevator, Jack turned and gave Rhys one last wink. Then he was gone.

“Handsome Jack just winked at me,” Vasquez breathed from behind Rhys’ shoulder.

“Congratulations,” Rhys said stonily.

Vasquez didn’t seem to hear him, though, turning around and practically floating back toward his office.

“I have to call Henderson,” he was mumbling. “Make sure we’re still on for this afternoon. Make sure he knows Handsome Jack’s been by. Handsome Jack… I have to find my receipt…”

With Jack safely off the floor and no dead bodies lying in his wake, the office returned slowly to normal. There was a palpable air of disappointment that Vasquez had managed to worm his way out of the encounter alive. Rhys wished he could share in it, but he had other things to worry about.

Such as Jack once again doing whatever he wanted and totally disregarding Rhys’ thoughts on the matter. Thoughts that Rhys had repeatedly and clearly expressed. No doubt Jack would have a million excuses prepared, and every last one of them sounding perfectly reasonable and not at all invasive and controlling. Which it totally was.

And also how to continue to keep Vasquez alive! Rhys hated Jack for putting him in a position where  _that_  was one of his concerns. At least most people could secretly long for their boss’s deaths in peace.

Rhys leaned back in his chair and glared through the stacks of files before him, not even pretending to work. Somehow, he thought Vasquez would be a little too preoccupied to care for the next few hours.

“Hey, what happened to the card reader on the vending machine?” someone called from the break room. “It looks like someone detached it? The wiring’s still exposed.”

There was a pause, and then several of Rhys’ neighbors stood up as one to glare into Ellen’s cubicle.

“I was going to put it back,” she said meekly. “…As soon as I figured out how.”

A series of groans and grumbled complaints went up, growing louder as the news traveled from cubicle to cubicle and everyone realized what had happened. It seemed that lunch today would necessitate a trip to the cafeteria.

Rhys could only hope he was about to contract a case of food poisoning so severe that his lack of insurance would bankrupt Jack completely. That’d show him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this took a while! i spent a really long time debating whether to split this chapter or not, and ultimately did. the next chapter will (real life permitting) be out sooner as a result, though, as i've already done a lot of work on it.
> 
> thank you for your patience. and thank you to [[@srahhh]](https://twitter.com/srahhh) for your invaluable edits and advice.
> 
> please let me know what you think! i will try to respond in a timely fashion, but you can come yell at me at [[@ineffmoth]](https://twitter.com/ineffmoth) if i don't.


	3. Chapter 3

At half-past noon, Rhys booked it toward an out of the way elevator. Not long after Jack’s departure and the discovery of her lunchtime sabotage, Ellen had leaned around the wall separating their cubicles to tell him about a nice soup and salad shop up in the hub. It was only a hint, but with the way his day was going, Rhys didn’t want to risk it turning into a full-blown invitation.

That was good thinking, too. As he got on, he saw her walking briskly in his direction, vending machine card reader still grasped tightly in one fist.

 _At least put down the evidence of_   _your crime and future intentions_ , Rhys thought, frantically jamming the ‘close door’ button.

The doors slid shut just in time. Rhys leaned forward and pressed his forehead against them, willing the cold metal to sooth his growing headache.

Life couldn’t just be easy for once, could it?

He got off at the next floor and swapped to another elevator, in case Ellen tried to follow him. The new elevator already had a handful of people in it, mostly R&D types judging by the lab coats and general sinister air. Rhys thought they were all strangers until he had already slipped inside and found himself standing beside a familiar woman.

“Oh, hey Dr. Jane, how are you?” Rhys said, startling a little when he realized who she was. “Long time, no see.”

Dr. Jane looked remarkably well for someone who had nearly died a month ago. She was as poised and strict as ever, lips pursed into a tight, thin line. She was flanked by two people, both obscured by large armfuls of files, but she carried nothing but a slim tablet in one hand. That hand and the arm attached to it were also the only noticeable change – they were now sleek, yellow, and metallic.

“Love the new arm,” Rhys said. He raised his own and waggled his fingers. “Look at us. We’re robo-buddies.”

Dr. Jane glared and gave him a critical once over.

“Rhys,” she greeted. There was a distinct chill in her voice. “I hope you’re aware of just what a setback you and Dr. Headland created by so suddenly withdrawing from the team. For future reference, it’s generally considered polite to put in two weeks’ notice before you quit.”

A series of extremely valid and honest excuses ran through Rhys’ head, but Dr. Jane did not look like she would care one whit for any of them.

“Sorry,” Rhys settled on.

Dr. Jane huffed, and turned away in dismissal. Clearly Rhys’ decision not to reach out to her for use as a reference had been a wise one.

One of the armfuls of files shifted and half of another familiar face appeared out of it, a little red from the strain.

“Hi, Rhys,” Benson said.

“Benson!” Rhys said with genuine pleasure. “I didn’t see you there. How’s it going?”

“Good,” Benson said. “I got promoted. I’m one of Dr. Jane’s personal assistants now.”

The files wavered dangerously overhead. The combined weight of all that paper looked like it might be enough to crush someone to death. Rhys hoped Benson’s promising career wasn’t about to be cut short beneath a mountain of data readouts.

“Good for you, buddy,” Rhys said. “I’m glad. No more running from monsters?”

“Thanks,” Benson smiled. He glanced at the back of Dr. Jane’s head, and then said, “I can’t really talk about it since you don’t have clearance anymore, but.” He nodded downward.

Rhys followed the jab of Benson’s chin to the floor. Or, more accurately, to Benson’s feet – he was wearing a brand-new pair of sneakers. They moved slightly as Rhys examined them, as if Benson was wiggling his toes.

“Oh,” Rhys said. “That’s.”

Benson cleared his throat.

“Promotion, though!” he said. “And Ines and I are still going steady. She’s working on a project with Dr. Spara in –”

“Benson,” Dr. Jane said sharply, without turning to look at either of them.

Benson winced, then smiled apologetically.

“It’s okay, I get it,” Rhys said. “I guess I can’t talk much, either. About me and.” He pointed upward and made a twirling motion with his finger.

There was an awkward shifting in the elevator and Rhys was abruptly reminded that, unlike the rest of Helios, a fair number of these people probably did know who he was. His arm fell awkwardly to his side.

Benson looked briefly uncomfortable. Then, suddenly, he said, “You seemed happy.” He blushed. “I mean, in the photo you posted. You seemed really happy.”

Rhys blinked, caught off guard.

He thought back to the beachfront on Opportunity, where he and Jack had laid in the sand. It had been a hot day, as every day was on Pandora, but there was a cool breeze and cold drinks to ease the burn of sunlight. Good company, too.

Rhys had built a sand castle and Jack had hovered, ostensibly too mature to participate, but not above offering criticism and advice on turret placement. He’d been suspiciously invested in the matter for a man who claimed that sandcastles were a ‘toddler game.’ Rhys had let him pretend and obligingly placed tiny spiraling shells in every location that was dictated to him. It had been a nice castle, with a moat deep enough to keep the rising tide at bay.

“Yeah,” Rhys said to Benson. “I am.” He smiled, softly at first, then wider as a thought occurred to him. “Hey, you, Ines, and I should get together sometime. The three of us. For drinks or something.”

“Oh, uh,” Benson said, glancing away. “Ines is kind of mad at you…”

“What? Why?”

“After you faked your death, I was really upset for a while,” Benson said. He quickly continued, “I’m not mad anymore, but Ines is, a little bit.”

“I didn’t fake my death, though,” Rhys argued. “Everyone just assumed I was dead.”

“Yeah, but you kind of let us,” Benson said. “And then you made a big joke out of it. It wasn’t very funny.”

Rhys actually thought it had been funny.

He opened up his mouth to apologize, anyway, but at that moment, there was a ding and the elevator came to a stop. The R&D employees began to shuffle out, Dr. Jane at the lead. Benson shifted his load in his arms and made to follow her.

“It was nice to see you, Rhys,” he said. “Alive and everything. But, um. I have to go. See you around.”

“Yeah,” Rhys said hollowly. “See you around.”

Benson hurried off after Dr. Jane, the top of his stack of papers barely clearing the doorframe without incident. The doors slid shut behind him and Rhys was left alone once more.

*

The cafeteria, an offshoot of the hub filled with restaurants and food stands, was crowded and noisy at the peak of the lunch hour. The air smelled thick with spice and grease, an array of cuisines that melded into each other as he wandered down the row, past a variety of meal options both familiar and strange.

Rhys’ stomach growled as he walked and he realized that, on top of being frustrated and disappointed, he was also very hungry. Food was step one. He could deal with the rest of it rationally once he’d eaten.

He found the closest, shortest line and got in it, not too concerned about what was about to be served. The main thing was to get through the hour, and then the next four hours after that, and then to go home and have a stern discussion with Butt Stallion about not following through on promises. And then to have basically the same conversation with Jack, but with hopefully less whinnying.

Then he would give Jack a blank piece of paper and a pen and tell him to explain, in his own words, why Rhys was upset and what he was going to do to make sure it never happened again. And then they would both be on the same page, finally, and everything would go back to normal. Normal-ish. Normal adjacent.

As the line slowly inched forward, and Rhys mulled this plan over in his head, he absently examined the back of the head of the man in front of him. He was much shorter than Rhys, with neatly combed hair and a stiff white collar. He was bent over something, concentrating and making quiet, punctuated sounds.

He swore suddenly, loudly enough that it broke Rhys’ internal conversation and drew his attention to what the man was doing. Over his shoulder, Rhys could see that he was playing a game on his handheld. Rhys squinted down at it.

“Whoa, are you playing a ROM of _Disgraced?_ ” Rhys asked, unable to help himself. “I didn’t even know those existed anymore.”

The man jumped, then turned and gave Rhys an evaluating look. After a second, he smiled slowly, smug and self-satisfied.

“Yes,” he said, adjusting his ECHO display glasses. “Yes I am. I won an auction for one of the old CDs they found in the mass liquidation graves on Morpheon. I ripped it myself.”

“That’s so cool,” Rhys said, grabbing a plastic tray as the line passed the utensil kiosk. “I’ve played _Disgraced 4_ like eighty times but not even – not even the arcade has the older ones.”

Jack also liked _Disgraced 4,_ although his playstyle was much different from Rhys’ preferred approach.

“Shoot him!” he had yelled as Rhys tried to silently ease through the shadows behind a guard. “This’ll take an hour, just shoot him already!”

“I’m not going to shoot him,” Rhys said. “He has a wife and kids. They’d be heartbroken.”

“So shoot them, too!” had been Jack’s helpful walkthrough tip.

Rhys had been a little surprised that Jack didn’t have the earlier games, but figured it probably wasn’t his priority.

“It was a close auction,” the man in front of Rhys said, “but nobody’s faster than me.” He tucked his lunch tray under one arm and extended a hand. “I’m Vaughn. I don’t think I’ve seen you around before – hard to miss the arm.”

“I’m Rhys,” Rhys said, shaking Vaughn’s hand. “Yeah, I’ve never eaten in the cafeteria before. But the vendor down on my level of Programming broke, so.”

Vaughn made a sound of understanding. “Word of advice, then,” he said. “Skip the skagburger. I’ve got an inside source that tells me it’s not actually skag.”

“I don’t think I’d want to eat it even if it was?” Rhys said. “Thanks for the head’s up, though. What do they have that’s good?”

They were nearing the head of the line, now. There was a menu posted up above, but it was a bare wall of text without much indication of what anything would look like or how it would actually taste.

“On a Tuesday?” Vaughn said. “Leave this to me.”

Rhys watched in curiosity as Vaughn approached the counter.

“Two orders of turkey tetrazzini, please,” he told the cashier.

One of the servers working the bar slid two plates toward them as the cashier rang the orders in. The plates held a gooey mess of wet noodles and brown meat that looked like someone had put it in their mouth, chewed for a bit, changed their mind, and spit it back out.

“Uh…” Rhys began.

“Trust me, it’s Helios’ best kept secret,” Vaughn said. “Looks disgusting, but tastes delicious. Only on Tuesdays, though. Supply shipments from the Edens come in on Tuesday mornings. Better to skip any exotic meats the rest of the week.”

“Your credits,” the cashier prompted, holding out an impatient hand.

Vaughn passed over his ID card – his photo looked much better than Rhys’ did – and Rhys did the same with his credit chip. Vaughn made a low sound of consideration when he saw it, but made no comment.

When the cashier returned their cards, Rhys placed his chip on the tray next to the plate and followed Vaughn out into the seating area. He hoped he hadn’t made a mistake trusting this total stranger’s gourmet advice or else his food poisoning wish might be about to come true.

Vaughn quickly singled out a small table in a corner of the cafeteria and sank into one of the chairs, eagerly digging into his noodles. Rhys eyed his own plate with apprehension, then took a careful bite.

“Oh, mmm,” he said. “You were right, this is good.”

He dug his fork back into the noodles and gathered a heaping serving for himself. The tetrazzini was warm and savory with a rich sauce and tender meat that fell apart in Rhys’ mouth. It was far better than the pre-packaged fast meals that the vending machine back down in Programming had dispensed. Maybe the trek up to the cafeteria was worth it.

“I’ve been on Helios for two and a half years,” Vaughn said. “At this point I know practically everything about this place.”

 _Probably not about the secret space hurps level,_ Rhys thought.

But he couldn’t help but find the confidence with which Vaughn had navigated the cafeteria kind of cool. And that _Disgraced_ ROM. He must’ve had lightning reflexes to be able to snag that CD from auction.

“What’s a turkey, anyway?” Rhys asked.

“I dunno,” Vaughn said. “Something like an ostrich, I think.”

“…What’s an ostrich?”

“This huge bird with a long neck and claws?” Vaughn said. “They had them on a recent episode of _As Promethea Burns_ for a kid’s party scene. One of them attacked the birthday girl and I’m not convinced it was scripted.”

“Oh, I used to watch that,” Rhys said. “But I lost interest after Barbara died.”

Vaughn laughed. “No way,” he said. “You really thought she was dead?”

“Uh,” Rhys said. “Yeah. She was impaled by a giant craboid. They gave her funeral a whole two-hour farewell episode.”

Vaughn looked at him, face full of pity.

“Dude,” he said gently, “it was closed casket.”

Rhys’ mouth dropped open. He set his fork down.

“Oh my god,” he said. “I’ve been so blind.”

Vaughn reached across the table to place a comforting hand on his arm.

“It’s going to be okay,” he said. “I own the whole series. We’ll get you caught back up in no time. You can come over and play _Disgraced_ if you want, too. I don’t own two or three, though.”

“Yes!” Rhys said, then stopped short as he remembered something. “But I just started work this week. I don’t have any days off for the next month.”

“Oh, bummer,” Vaughn said. “Congrats on the job, though. What are you doing?”

“Data mining.”

“Data – you’re not working for Hugo Vasquez, are you?” Vaughn asked.

“You know him?”

Vaughn winced in sympathy and shook his head sadly. “Everybody knows him. Vasquez is like the biggest asshole on this station. I once heard him brag about spitting on homeless people. And he’s everywhere, constantly schmoozing and trying to make connections with the higher-ups. No one likes him.”

“Great,” Rhys said. “He’s notorious.”

“If you work for him, good luck getting time off _ever_ ,” Vaughn said. “That guy hasn’t approved PTO for anyone in like a year.”

Rhys wasn’t too worried about that. He wasn’t above using Jack’s pull to get a day off from work here and there. Still, it was impressive that, of all the dicks in the floating bag of dicks that was Helios, Rhys had managed to single out the most dick-ish one of all.

Or, he thought, as his irritation with Jack flared again, dulled now that he had eaten but still alive enough to wave its arms and jump, the second most dick-ish.

The clicking of heels snapped across the floor nearby and Rhys glanced up to see a tall, attractive woman coming to a stop beside their table. She had dreadlocks softly falling over one side of her head and tight cornrows along the other. When she made eye contact with Rhys, she beamed. 

“Hi there,” she said. “I can’t help but notice you have a platinum credit chip.” She pulled a chair from a nearby table and sat between Vaughn and Rhys, plunking her own tray down as she went. “I’m Yvette, nice to meet you, you should buy me lunch sometime.”

“Uh, sorry,” Rhys said slowly. “I have a boyfriend. It’s his credit chip, actually.”

Yvette laughed. “No, no, no. You’re not in my league. Let me rephrase: I work in Requisitions. You have a platinum credit chip. This,” she said, gesturing between them, “is networking.”

Rhys looked at Vaughn. Vaughn rolled his eyes.

“Just go along with her,” he said. “It’s easier in the long run.”

“Okay, I guess,” Rhys said to Yvette.

“Excellent,” Yvette said. “What’s your name?”

“Rhys.”

“Tell me more about your boyfriend, Rhys,” Yvette said. “Does he have a brother? Sister? Please say sister.”

“God, I hope not,” Rhys muttered. He glanced at Yvette’s tray. “Is that a skagburger? I heard it’s not really skag. Or that it is, which might be worse.”

“I know, I’m Vaughn’s source,” Yvette said. She picked up the burger and took a bite. After chewing and swallowing, she added, “It doesn’t bother me how the sausage gets made. Only how it tastes. What’s your boyfriend do?”

Rhys hesitated.

“He’s… an engineer.”

That wasn’t, technically, a lie.

“Wait, your boyfriend gave you a credit chip with no limit on it, but he’s an engineer?” Vaughn asked. “I work in Accounting. I’ve seen their pay slips; those guys aren’t getting paid that much.”

“…He invests?” Rhys said.

Vaughn and Yvette looked at each other. Then, Vaughn shrugged.

“The market _is_ very strong right now,” he said.

“Hm,” Yvette said, taking another bite.

“I wonder if he can give me some tips,” Vaughn said thoughtfully. “I’m trying to save up for an exercise bike to put in my office.”

“I dunno!” Rhys said quickly. “Invest in Hyperion! Anyway, since you know Vasquez, you don’t happen to know any of his, like, major weaknesses or embarrassing secrets, do you?”

“You work under Vasquez?” Yvette asked with a laugh. “You poor bastard. If I were you, I’d just quit and mooch off your boyfriend.”

“Do you or don’t you?” Rhys asked.

“Sorry,” Vaughn said with a shrug. “I try to stay far away from that guy. One time he tousled my hair and I swear I smelled like eau de sleazebag for days.”

Rhys looked pointedly at Yvette.

“Sounds like trouble,” she said. “Good luck, though.”

That wasn’t a no. Rhys wondered what they did in Requisitions and whether or not it involved playing a lot of poker. Nisha and Yvette, he decided, would probably get along famously. Better that they never met.

“But, hey, meet me for lunch here again tomorrow,” Vaughn said. “I’ll lend you my _As Promethea Burns_ collection. You can tell me what you think about the plot twist in episode seven hundred and twelve. Shit gets weird.”

“Deal,” Rhys agreed. “And thanks, Vaughn. For that and for the lunch pointers. I appreciate it.”

“Of course,” Vaughn said. “I can’t let a guy with a proper appreciation for rare video games eat skagburger. It’d be wrong. Bros?” He extended his fist over the table.

Rhys looked at it for a moment, and then looked down at his hand, the one Butt Stallion had nuzzled earlier that morning.

 _Maybe you came through for me after all,_ he thought.

“Bros,” he agreed, and fist-bumped Vaughn.

* 

Rhys spent the rest of lunch chatting with Vaughn and Yvette. After exchanging ECHO frequencies with both of them (as well as a promise to buy Yvette lunch the next day), he returned to work feeling greatly cheered. He probably could’ve even made it through another four mind-numbing hours of sorting through Elpis garbage, but when he got back to his cubicle, the boxes were gone.

Vasquez was in the middle of his meeting with Henderson, which meant he wasn’t around to bother Rhys. Instead, he’d sent him an email explaining that, with Handsome Jack’s apparent attention on the department, it was time for everyone to buckle down and focus on only the most critical projects. Rhys would instead be liaising with several other department members (Ellen not included) to look at intercepted transmissions from Maliwan.

The day was turning around.

The cherry on top was returning to the penthouse to discover that Jack’s ferns in the entrance hall had been decimated nearly to non-existence.

He went and found Butt Stallion, wandering around the rec room by the billiards table, and rubbed her face affectionately. It was hard and cold and the edge of her cheekbone was kind of sharp, but hopefully she could feel Rhys’ appreciation.

“Good girl,” he cooed at her. “That’ll show him. Thanks for the friendship luck.”

He was in the middle of combing and braiding her mane when Jack arrived, announced by the muffled slamming of the front door. Rhys dropped the brush onto the billiards table as Butt Stallion trotted off, deeper into the sprawling maze of Jack’s home, likely to avoid getting in trouble for her snacking.

It was a few minutes before Jack found him, by which time Rhys had worked his annoyance back to its fullest just by replaying Jack’s howling laughter from earlier that day in his head. Dick. 

“There you are,” Jack said. “Do you know what happened to the ferns out front?”

“No, why, is something wrong with them?” Rhys asked.

Jack squinted at him.

“…Did you rip up all my ferns?” he asked.

“Why would I rip up all your ferns?”

“I don’t _know_ , that’s why I’m – forget it,” Jack said, giving up. “I’ll put something else in. Ferns were getting boring. Never saw the appeal, to be honest, but they were really expensive, so I figured there must be something to it.”

“I don’t care about your stupid ferns, Jack,” Rhys said.

“Okay,” Jack said slowly, “I’m sensing that you might still be mad at me.”

Rhys stared at him incredulously.

“Uh, _yeah_ , I am,” he said. “What the fuck was today about, Jack? I told you multiple times to just leave it alone.”

“Yeah, and I told you that pissed me off,” Jack said. “You think I’m just gonna stand back and not ask questions when you come home and crawl into my arms like a kicked puppy? I had to make sure there weren’t some throats that needed cutting.”

“Oh, is that what your motivation was?” Rhys asked dryly. “Because, from my perspective, it looked like you were making fun of me in front of my asshole boss and all of my coworkers.”

“To be fair,” Jack said, “I did also warn you about roast-o-clock. And while we’re on the subject of your asshole boss –”

Rhys groaned.

“– is that a throat that needs cutting?”

“No!” Rhys said.

Jack stepped forward and bracketed Rhys in against the billiards table. Rhys crossed his arms, a barrier between them, and held his ground.

“What’d he fuckin’ do, babe?” Jack asked. “To get you so mad?”

“Jack, I asked you not to get involved,” Rhys said. “I set a boundary and you –”

“Rhys. Tell me.”

Rhys sighed and closed his eyes. Clearly this conversation wasn’t going anywhere until this was out of the way. Fine. Whatever. He’d get it over with and tell Jack that Vasquez had –

Um.

That the reason he’d been so angry and had gotten a shitty job that he loathed and would be suffering through for the foreseeable future was because –

Hm.

Rhys winced and risked a peek at Jack. His expression was dark and intent.

Rhys cleared his throat and mumbled, “Hecutmeinline.”

“…What?” Jack asked.

“He, uh.” Rhys uncrossed his arms and scratched the side of his neck. He looked at the ceiling, then at Jack’s pocket watch, clipped to his lapel. Finally, he said, “Vasquez. Cut me in line.”

There was a long, drawn out silence.

“Babe,” Jack said.

There was another silence.

"He was very rude about it,” Rhys said. “He’s a huge jerk.”

Jack let out a loud, heavy breath that sounded like every muscle in his body easing out of contraction. To further support this, the tension flooded from him entirely, and he dropped his forehead onto Rhys’ shoulder.

“He cut you in line,” he repeated.

“Yeah.”

“He didn’t corner you in the hallway after class and take your lunch money?”

“No.”

“There was no bad touching?”

Rhys wrinkled his nose. “No! Ew! Tell me that’s not what you’ve been imagining.”

“Well, I don’t know!” Jack said, raising his head again. “You didn’t give me much to go off of, sweetheart. Suddenly you’re mad as hell at some nobody peon, running around doing all this stupid shit to get back at him, what am I supposed to think? Not that he, what, _briefly inconvenienced you!_ ”

“He was extremely condescending and there were other people around,” Rhys said. “It was embarrassing and insulting. Apparently, this is just the way he is, too, so I’m doing everybody a big favor by taking him down a peg.”

“You’re the one down a peg!” Jack pointed out.

Rhys didn’t have much of a counterargument, except for a weak, “I made a small calculation error during the planning phase.”

“Do you know,” Jack said, “how stressed out I’ve been? Son of a _taint_. I’m tempted to airlock him just for that.”

“Don’t airlock him!” Rhys said. “If you kill him now, I won’t get to humiliate him later, and then all of this will have been for nothing. This is why I didn’t tell you in the first place. You get homicidal over the smallest things.”

“It’s not small,” Jack said. “It’s you.”

Rhys bit his lip against the warmth that swelled from deep in his bones. He was still mad. Jack had still fucked up.

“Look,” he started, “if I ever got hurt, if I ever really needed your help, I promise I would tell you. If I was in trouble, there’s nobody else I would call.”

“Well, _duh_.”

“Jack,” Rhys said sternly. “I set a boundary and you ignored it. That you were worried is sweet, but it’s not an excuse. You came and messed around at my job, which I explicitly told you not to do, and which there wasn’t anything I could do to stop. You’re lucky Vasquez didn’t decide you thought hazing me was funny and do something even worse.”

Jack’s brows furrowed and he opened his mouth, probably to threaten Vasquez’s life again.

“This isn’t about Vasquez,” Rhys said, cutting him off at the pass. “This is about me and you. I need you to promise you’ll listen when I ask you not to do something from now on. Promise you’ll stop making decisions for me, Jack.”

“I’m not going to just stand back and watch shit happen,” Jack said hotly.

“I’m not asking you to!” Rhys said. “I’m asking you to listen to me. And – and to talk to me. Tell me what you’re thinking.”

“You’re not exactly the poster boy for openness, Rhys,” Jack said. “I had to go play detective to figure out what the hell you were doing with your _life_. Not to mention the whole reason we even –”

“Don’t even think about bringing up Tediore,” Rhys snapped. “That’s totally different and you know it.” 

“Is it? Because you hiding vital information from me is starting to seem like a habit.”

“Okay, look, I’m sorry!” Rhys said. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you what was going on. But I wouldn’t have to if I knew you weren’t going to do something extreme without my consent. So can you just – just tell me you won’t.” He reached out and placed his flesh hand against Jack’s chest, right above his heart. “Please.”

Jack examined Rhys as if he had said something strange. Rhys wondered if anyone had ever seriously asked Jack to change his behavior before. He wondered if Jack had ever seriously considered doing it in response. There was a tense cant to Jack’s shoulders that told Rhys the answer, to at least one of those questions, was probably ‘no.’

“Okay,” Jack said at last. He reached up and covered Rhys’ hand with his own. “Okay. But if you get hurt –”

“I’m not going to get hurt on your station,” Rhys said. “Unless there’s another containment breach in R&D or on the space hurps cannibal level, but they’ll have to eat their way through a hundred levels first and we’ll be –”

“– safely jettisoned way before they reach us,” Jack finished. He sighed. “Okay. I got it. So stop hiding shit from me, babe. My grey streak is pretty sexy but I’m not totally ready to commit to being a silver fox.”

Rhys snorted, but smiled. “Okay.”

He leaned forward to kiss Jack on the cheek, but Jack turned his head and locked their lips together. After a moment, he pulled away.

“So, cat’s out of the bag, your plan has been successfully foiled, you can finally quit this job, right?” he asked.

“No, I can’t,” Rhys said. “I have to humiliate Vasquez first.”

Jack groaned loudly and threw his head back.

“It’s a work in progress!” Rhys said. “All great artists have to suffer before they can produce a masterpiece. And besides, it’s not… terrible. That terrible. Completely unbearable. Some of the other Hyperion employees are decent.”

“I can’t believe you’re putting up with this shitty job over a guy cutting you in line,” Jack said. “This is so much wasted effort over something so meaningless.”

“Ugh, says you,” Rhys said. “This side of the station has five hundred levels but you redid the numbering so it skips from four hundred and nineteen to four hundred and twenty-one, all because you wanted to call the penthouse level four-twenty. The penthouse which you, by the way, left unlocked _again_ today.”

“You know, the name Vasquez really does ring a bell, though,” Jack said, ignoring him. “I’ve been trying to figure out where I know him from all day, but I keep drawing a blank. Company sports team? You think he’s a baseball guy?”

“I can’t picture him running without being chased,” Rhys said.

Jack blinked at him in confusion, and then his face cleared. “That’s right,” he said with a chuckle. “You’ve never seen a Hyperion company baseball match.”

“What?”

“Well, baseball’s, like, super boring,” Jack said. “So I added some obstacles and stuff to spice it up.”

“Like… like what?” Rhys asked with trepidation.

“Some guns, some loaders, you know,” Jack said. “Nothing ultra-lethal.”

“Guns are lethal!”

“Almost nobody’s died,” Jack said. “It’s better this way, trust me, way more entertaining. But, no, I don’t think that’s where I recognize Lose-o Assquez from. I’d remember seeing him in a team uniform. ‘Cause he’d look super dumb.”

“He looks pretty dumb normally,” Rhys said. 

“You’re right. He looks like the kind of guy who still calls his mother every weekend.”

“Hey!” Rhys said. “I do that!”

“It’s cute when you do it, though,” Jack said. “All loyal and loving and shit. When this guy does it, it just seems kind of pathetic. Speaking of, are you ever going to introduce me to your mom?”

“Oh, uhhhhh…” Rhys looked askance.

“I won’t scare her,” Jack said. “I’ll be on my best, most charming behavior. Cross my heart.”

“That’s not… really the issue,” Rhys said.

There were only two ways that meeting would end. Rhys couldn’t decide which one he found more frightening. To prevent either, Jack and his mother were never, ever going to speak to each other, no matter how much they asked. Or passive aggressively pressured, in his mother’s case.

“Maybe next time,” Rhys lied. He scrambled to find something to change the topic to. “By the way, why don’t you own a copy of the first _Disgraced_?”

A sour look crossed Jack’s face.

“My auction got sniped,” he muttered. “Friggin’… ECHObay… stupid… the program should’ve…”

 _Wow_ , Rhys thought. _Vaughn, you might be the coolest guy alive._

*

After that, everything felt as though it had settled. An ease filled Rhys, a warm confidence. Life had become a little strange, recently, but it wasn’t bad. He could make it through the torture of data mining. It would only be a little longer, he told himself. Then things would start going the way he wanted them to.

Other things had. He’d made friends. His world was expanding. Not even a full day later, he shot off a message to Vaughn in horror over the new wig they’d given Barbara for her revival on _As Prometha Burns_.

“I am trying so hard not to spoil you right now,” Vaughn had instantly responded. “It gets so much worse.”

“She finally goes bald????” Rhys asked.

“Not even close, my friend,” Vaughn said. “Not even close.”

More than that, he had made Jack listen to him.

He should probably get a trophy for that. A certificate of commendation for contributions to galactic peace, at the very least. Did they give those out anymore? It felt like it’d been a while since anyone had been awarded one. But that might’ve just been the fact that no one was presently contributing to galactic peace.

If everything was better, though, it wasn’t necessarily perfect.

That night, Rhys woke with a start, an inexplicable knot of dread in his throat. It took him a second to figure out what had startled him awake. Momentarily, he thought it had been a nightmare. Then he felt the pain in his wrist.

“Ow, fuck, _Jack_ ,” he yelped, trying to yank his arm out of Jack’s grip.

Jack’s fingers were wrapped around him so tightly that the indents they made in Rhys’ skin had gone white at the edges. Jack was fast asleep, but his jaw was clenched, and there was sweat beading on his forehead.

“ _Wake up_ ,” Rhys hissed, shaking his shoulder.

Jack jolted upright, dragging in a lungful of air, as if he was breaching the surface of a deep lake in which he’d been drowning. As he sat up, he released Rhys’ wrist. Rhys drew it back against his chest.

“Are you okay?” Rhys asked. “You were hanging onto me really tightly.”

Jack swallowed and ran one palm across his face, brushing the sweat out of his eyes. His fingers lingered on the edge of his bare scar, like he was reassuring himself that it was still there. Or rediscovering it.

“It’s nothing,” he said hoarsely. “Just a dream.” His gaze fell to Rhys’ arm, cradled in his cybernetic hand. “Did I hurt you?”

“No,” Rhys said.

Jack looked pained.

“No, look, it’s fine,” Rhys said, extending his arm. “You just startled me.”

Jack gently took his wrist and ran his thumb over it. There was still a white outline in Rhys’ skin in the shape of Jack’s fingers.

“Sorry,” he said after a moment.

“It’s fine,” Rhys said again. “What were you dreaming about?”

Jack looked up at Rhys’ face. His eyes darted from side to side, examining, inspecting. Once he had cataloged everything and found it to his satisfaction, visible relief flashed over him. Then it was gone, hidden under carefully constructed ease.

“It was nothing,” he said.

He leaned back against the pillows, taking deep breaths in through his nose. Rhys bit his lip, and reached out and snagged Jack’s wrist, pressing his fingers against the inside flesh. Jack’s heartbeat was going wild.

Rhys sighed and dropped his fingers to the faded blue outline of Jack’s tattoo. He ran them slowly along the zig-zagging pattern on the inside of the band. It was nearly the same color as his own sleeve, he noticed. Maybe a little darker. He followed the tattoo all the way around, and then again, in an endless, unfaltering loop. A constant circuit.

Jack’s eyes fluttered shut. When Rhys checked again, his heartbeat had calmed.

“Hey,” Rhys said quietly.

Jack’s eyes opened again.

“You know I’m not going anywhere, right?” Rhys said.

Jack stared at him blankly.

“I love you, you idiot,” Rhys whispered.

Jack stared for a beat longer, and then softened. He took his arm back from Rhys’ grip and wrapped it around Rhys’ shoulders instead, pulling him close.

“Yeah, I know,” he said. “I love you, too. Idiot.”

Rhys curled up against him, as closely as he could. He fell back asleep like just like that, Jack’s arm heavy around him, but no longer oppressive. If Jack had anymore nightmares, they didn’t wake Rhys.

But if Jack ever fell back asleep, there was no sign of that, either.

Rhys couldn’t help but worry about whatever it was that had disturbed Jack so deeply. What kind of nightmares plagued Handsome Jack?

The knot of dread lingered in Rhys’ throat for a long time after.

Work, on the other hand, took two steps forward and one step back. The Maliwan transmissions were fascinating, if not – as far as Rhys could tell – useful.

Mostly, he spent his time sorting ECHO transcripts by keywords and creating charts mapping out their intersections, highlighting conversations and individuals that formed repeated patterns. The data was then sent across the floor to analysis, where they actually waded through the content to determine the value and meaning of these patterns. But Rhys now knew quite a lot of seemingly useless information about the other company. For example, they spent a weirdly large amount of money just on pomade shipments.

And that would’ve been fine – if it hadn’t been for Vasquez. 

Jack’s visit to data mining hadn’t only served to save Rhys from busy work, it also now had Vasquez breathing down everyone’s necks. He was constantly hovering and checking to make sure no one was slacking off, popping up out of thin air during idle conversation to snidely remind everyone that, as Helios was a space station, using oxygen for non-company purposes did qualify as theft of office supplies.

He made people draft and redraft reports and then draft them again, quibbling over unimportant issues such as sentence structure and general visual appearance. He timed breaks to a ridiculous degree, at one point so harshly berating Ellen for returning from the bathroom one second past her allotted three minutes that she burst into tears and spent the rest of the day crying quietly in her cubicle. Even Rhys might have begun to feel sorry for her, if it weren’t for the intermittent mechanical clinking sounds that punctuated her muffled sobs.

Only Rhys’ daily lunches with Vaughn and Yvette carried him through. He didn’t dare complain to Jack, lest he accidentally unearth the corpse of the disagreement they had just laid to rest, but his two new friends were receptive and understanding.

Or, well, Vaughn was receptive and understanding. Rhys couldn’t quite get a read on Yvette, except that she seemed to like him just fine after he bought her an expensive steak and a huge platter of desserts.

“He’s the worst person I’ve ever met,” Rhys groused, furiously swirling his mashed potatoes with a spoon. “Today a woman on my floor requested maternity leave and he told her that, until we meet our quarterly goal, she could plan on giving birth in her cubicle.”

“What an asshole,” Vaughn said. “It’s like he’s every horrible personality trait condensed into one body of corporate evil. You know who he reminds me of? Tiberius Klein.”

Tiberius Klein had been a season one villain on _As Promethea Burns_.

“Oh my god, you’re right,” Rhys said. “It’s the sneer. The sneer is exactly the same.”

“Don’t you guys ever talk about normal people things?” Yvette asked. She was typing rapidly on her ECHO, only superficially participating in the conversation. “Like, real life stuff? It’s always ECHOflicks and sims with you two.”

“Not always!” Rhys defended. “Although, now that you bring it up, Vaughn, you’re right about the new _APB_ episodes. There are all these evil twin plots all of a sudden? Not that it’s bad. I think the writing has actually improved. It’s just strange.”

“I totally know what you mean,” Vaughn said. “That episode where Jasmine finally got rid of her husband by killing her own evil twin and using the body to fake her own death, driving him to suicide was… weirdly touching. And then when she and Victor had that heart to heart about his addiction to cyborg enhancements? I teared up, bro.”

“I’m so glad you said that,” Rhys gushed. “I was too embarrassed to admit it, but I cried like a baby.”

“Ugh,” Yvette said. “Nerds.”

Yvette was just jealous of their deep and meaningful new friendship. Probably.

*

On Friday night, after a long week of Vasquez, dotted with small oases of Vaughn, Rhys returned to the penthouse feeling utterly exhausted. It was for this reason that, when the front door slid open at the slightest touch of his hand on the knob, it annoyed Rhys more than it usually did. 

“Jack!” Rhys yelled as he kicked his shoes off. “You left the door unlocked again! One of these days I’m going to steal all your stuff and sell it to your crazy fans just to make a point!”

He walked into the living room, intent on seeking Jack out to demonstrate how the locking mechanism functioned, only to stop short.

There was a young woman watching Rhys warily from where she stood by the windows, one hand running over Butt Stallion’s braided mane. She had a soft, round face with a button nose and wide eyes. Her black hair was long on one side and shaven close to the skull on the other. Rhys didn’t recognize her, but she was wearing a sleeveless black shirt, and there was no mistaking the tattoo crawling up one bare arm and shoulder. She was a siren. There was only one siren he could think of who might appear so suddenly on Helios.

“ _Angel?_ ” he said in disbelief.

“…Who are you?” Angel asked.

Her hand dropped from Butt Stallion. She looked poised to turn and run.

“Uh, I’m… Jack is my… Your dad and I…” Rhys cleared his throat awkwardly. “Wow, I really wish I’d had time to prep for this conversation. I’m Rhys.”

“Oh,” Angel said. Her face cleared and she relaxed slightly. “Rhys. Jack’s talked about you in his messages.”

“He has?” Rhys asked. Had Jack really told his daughter about him? That was worryingly affectionate of him. Then Rhys really thought about it and groaned. “Oh my god, please tell me he didn’t call me something embarrassing like his ‘hot slice.’”

“Uh, no.” Angel’s cheeks pinked. “He hadn’t said anything… like that. He just… mentioned your name a few times. Uh.”

“Oh,” Rhys said in a strangled voice. He cleared his throat again. “Do you… can I get you something to drink?”

“…I’m okay, thanks.”

Rhys tried to think of something to say to his boyfriend’s daughter who apparently hadn’t known he was dating her dad and to whom he had just accidentally introduced himself as her father’s ‘hot slice,’ but drew a blank.

Which was not to say he didn’t want to speak to her. He was intensely curious, and had been since he’d first learned of her existence.

Where had she been all this time? Why was she back? Jack had made it sound like there wasn’t much of a chance he’d ever see her again, that’d she’d walk over hot lava before willingly returning to her father. What had changed?

And. What was she like? It was clear she had taken mostly after her mother in looks, whoever that even was, except for her eyes, which were the same color as Jack’s single blue eye. Did she share his quirks? His habits? Any of his personality? Or was she completely different? Was she Jack’s child in blood alone?

But how did you even _begin_ to ask any of that? And to your boyfriend’s daughter to whom you had just accidentally introduced yourself as her dad’s ‘hot slice.’

“Um,” Angel started as the pause began to stretch on for too long, “is Jack –”

She was interrupted by the sound of the door slamming open and closed again.

“Rhys, you left the door unlocked!” Jack yelled from the hall. “And I’m not even gonna hold it over your head what a hypocrite that makes you since it doesn’t matter at all, because even if someone was stupid enough to think a lock was my only security measure, they’d still be instantly vaporized –”

He froze in the doorway, one arm halfway out of his jacket.

“Angel,” he said dumbly.

“Hi, Jack,” Angel said, glancing between him and Rhys with something just shy of amusement. “I let myself in. I hope that’s alright.”

“What are… how… why…” Jack stammered. “Are you okay?”

Angel looked surprised, and then her face went carefully blank.

“I’m fine,” she said.

Jack glanced between Angel and Rhys for a moment, as though he was uncertain where to focus. There was panic in his eyes, a raw thread of fear that made Rhys himself feel suddenly vulnerable and afraid. He’d never seen Jack like this before, not even that first time he’d removed his mask, or when he’d thought Rhys had betrayed him. It was like he was standing in the headlights of an oncoming train, frozen.

At last, he settled on looking at his daughter, taking her in for what was likely the first time in four years. She was still young, probably in her teens or only barely out of them. She must have changed and grown immensely since Jack last saw her. She must have seemed like a stranger.

Rhys, who had been torn between crossing to Jack and leaving entirely, felt suddenly that he could only do the latter. He was intruding.

“I think I’ll just…” he began, jerking his thumb over his shoulder toward any room other than the one they were currently in.

“ _No_ ,” both Angel and Jack said at the same time.

They looked at each other in surprise, and then away again. It did not make Rhys feel better about the situation, but he dropped his arm and stayed put.

“What, ah, what brings you back to Helios?” Jack asked. He tucked his hands in his jean pockets in faux casualness. He only managed ‘nervous.’

“I… there’s a thing coming up,” Angel said. “On Pandora.”

She rubbed her arm awkwardly and glanced at Butt Stallion, who stared blankly up at her.

“I didn’t come to… catch up,” Angel said. “I came on business. Janey and Athena are getting married.”

“Athena,” Jack repeated. “Married.”

Angel nodded.

“That’s… bizarre,” Jack said. “She’s capable of love? To be honest I used to wonder if she was a robot. She was always all,” He brought his arms up into L’s and started moving them in stiff, robotic mimicry. “‘Do the mission. Achieve the objective. Complete the job. Report. Report. Report.’ Although I guess she did flirt with that mechanic on Elpis or whatever.”

“Yeah, that mechanic was Janey,” Angel said, scowling. “They’re super happy and in love and they’re getting married. Athena quit being a vault hunter and they have a place together and everything is great, no thanks to you.”

Jack blinked.

“I was just –” he started. He stopped himself, and began again with, “I was a little busy at the time trying to stop a madwoman from destroying the moon. If you recall. Some details might have slipped through the cracks.” He took a deep, steadying breath. “So. Athena, feared Atlas assassin, killer of thousands, is getting married. Cool. Good for her. Glad somebody got something out of that whole friggin’ –” He stopped himself again and a muscle in his jaw twitched.

There was a long, awkward pause. Rhys, who had no idea who or what they were talking about, wished he wasn’t so tall, because it made shrinking or turning invisible more difficult than it already was.

“Right, well,” Angel said. She looked as uncomfortable as Rhys felt. “The point is, there’s going to be a wedding. It’s in a few days and it’s going to be really big. A lot of people you… know are going to be there.”

At that, Jack’s whole demeanor shifted.

“A wedding!” he said. “Why didn’t you say so? Oh man, I haven’t been to a wedding in years. I mean, usually I avoid them, because it’s a whole event about somebody else and not me, funerals too, but the old Elpis crew? This’ll be fun! Alcohol, fireworks, food – do they have a caterer yet? I have this guy from –”

“You’re not invited, Jack!”

“What?” Jack said, confused. “Why not?”

Whatever discomfort Angel was feeling seemed to bleed into incredulity. Her shoulders dropped and she gaped at Jack as if he’d sprouted a second head.

“ _Because nobody likes you_.”

“That’s not true,” Jack scoffed. “Timothy loves me! We’re best pals.”

“The last time you two spoke,” Angel said, “you threatened to carve his face off with a butter knife if you ever saw him again.”

“You’ve taken that completely out of context,” Jack said. “I was setting him free, like at the end of _White Skag_. Y’know, ‘Go on, get outta here, boy! Don’t ever come back!’”

“You threw a chair at him,” Angel said. “Also, Tim’s not a dog.”

“…That’s debatable.”

“It’s not –” Angel groaned in frustration. “I didn’t come here to invite you to Athena and Janey’s wedding. I came here to tell you it’s happening – because there’s no way you weren’t going to notice a big vault hunter gathering happening on Pandora – and to tell you to stay away.”

Her fists clenched.

“Don’t try to sneak in,” she said. “And don’t send an army or something. And don’t try to spy, because I’ll stop you. Just let them have a single nice day where you leave everyone alone.”

Jack glared at her. Angel stood with her back straight, shoulders squared, and glared right back.

“…Is Nisha going?” Jack asked.

“Nobody likes her either,” Angel said.

“What about Wilhelm?”

“I’m not in charge of the guest list,” Angel said. “I don’t even know where Wilhelm is right now. He works for you, doesn’t he?”

“Contractually, I guess,” Jack said. “He stopped talking to me after I suggested he get therapy. Called me a hypocrite and left for Promethea. Like, geeze, I was just trying to be helpful. You know, everyone is always all, ‘ _You’re so mean, Jack! Just be nicer, Jack!_ ’ and then when I try to do something – _hurgh_ – _selfless_ , they get all mad at me for it.”

“He was right,” Angel said flatly. “You need therapy.”

Jack’s mouth dropped open and he pressed his hands to his chest, as if struck. He looked to Rhys for support. Rhys looked quickly up at the ceiling and pretended to be entranced by the painted tile map of the six galaxies.

“Oh, wow, I see how it is,” Jack said.

“Anyway, that’s all I came for,” Angel said. “You’re not invited. You can’t go. Don’t invade.” She raised a finger and pointed it at him. “Or… or else.”

“Right, yeah, okay, whatever,” Jack said morosely.

He still seemed hung up on the therapy thing.

Angel eyed him carefully, as though searching out any sign of duplicity, and then let out a deep breath. She nodded once in satisfaction.

“Can I go to the wedding?” Rhys asked suddenly.

They both turned to stare at him.

“I think it might be interesting,” he hurried to explain, which was not the truth at all.

It looked like Angel was about to leave, and Rhys still wanted to talk to her. He didn’t know if he’d ever get the chance again. A wedding sounded like the perfect, neutral place to do that.

“If you want to,” Angel said at the exact same time Jack said, “No way.”

Jack looked between Angel and Rhys incredulously. “No! Not happening!”

“Why can’t I?” Rhys asked, annoyed. He hadn’t been asking Jack.

“Because it’s dangerous!” Jack said.

“How is it dangerous?” Rhys asked.

“Are you kidding me?” Jack said, flabbergasted. “ _How is it dangerous?_ ”

“Angel is going,” Rhys pointed out.

“Angel’s a siren; she can kill someone with her brain.”

“Vault hunters will be there.”

“They’re the ones who make it dangerous!”

“Well, it doesn’t matter what you think, because I don’t need your permission,” Rhys snapped at Jack.

“Is that so?” Jack started. “Is that what you think, Rhys? That you can just do whatever you want?”

“Yeah, it is!” Rhys said. Sarcastically, he continued, “What, are you going to stop me?”

“If you make me!”

“What the fuck, Jack,” Rhys said, a stab of hurt lancing through him. “This is literally what I was talking about – you do this all the time and I’m sick of it. It’s not your decision. You’re my boyfriend, not my father!”

“Um!” Angel cut in.

Rhys’ gut dropped. He’d forgotten she was there.

“I – I didn’t mean…”

Angel wouldn’t look him in the eye. Rhys glanced at Jack, but his expression was shuttered.

“It’s fine,” Angel said. “But I’m going now. Rhys, I’ll send you the details later, in case you…still want to come. If not. It was nice to meet you.”

That sounded like a lie.

“Angel,” Jack said quickly, “you don’t have to go.”

“I do,” Angel said. “Goodbye, Jack. Rhys.”

There was a snap in the air, and a purple light flooded the room, its tendrils spiking out like cracks in the fabric of the universe. A sharp smell of ozone and a low roar accompanied it. Rhys stumbled back a step in shock, but Jack and Butt Stallion seemed unfazed. When the light had subsided, Angel was gone, and the living room was plunged into silence.

For a moment.

Jack rounded on Rhys, furious.

“Good job, you scared her away,” he said. “First time I’ve seen my daughter in years, and you chase her off.”

“ _I_ scared her off?” Rhys said. “Are you serious? You’re the one who got all controlling and –”

“I’m not being controlling, I’m trying to talk _some sense into you_ ,” Jack said. “You want to go to _Pandora_. Do you even remember what happened the last time you did that? You nearly died!”

“Only because you –” Rhys pinched the bridge of his nose. “Look, it’s dangerous, fine, but that’s my risk to take. It’s a wedding. Angel said it herself, it’s just one nice day. If it’ll make you feel better I’ll bring someone with me. Actually, I recently made friends with this guy in Accounting and –”

“That shrimp?” Jack scoffed. “You really think he’d be in any way useful in a fire fight? He doesn’t even work out regularly.” 

Rhys gaped at him. “Are you – have you been spying on me?” he asked, alarmed. “Have you been spying on my best friend?”

“Best friend?” Jack repeated. “How can he be your best friend; you’ve known him less than a week!”

“And it feels like a lifetime!” Rhys said.

Jack let out a strangled, wordless sound of frustration.

“Rhys, when the fuck are you going to wake up and get it?” Jack asked. “The amount of shit that goes wrong in your life, you think you’d have figured it out by now. Good things don’t just happen unless you make them happen. You think a wedding full of bandits is just gonna be a regular old party where nothing goes wrong? You think a cool new pal is just going to fall into your lap, just like that? He could be an assassin from Tediore for all you know!”

“Tediore?” Rhys said. “Why would they waste their money sending an assassin after me? Do you know how _insane_ you sound right now? Holy shit, you promised me, Jack. You promised you’d stop doing this!”

“I haven’t _done_ anything!” Jack said, voice rising in volume. “All I’m doing is monitoring the situation!”

“You’re _spying_ on me!” Rhys said, raising his own voice over Jack’s. “How can you not see how creepy and invasive that is? Just like the media blackout, just like the Vasquez thing, you’re always going behind my back and –”

“I wouldn’t have to go behind your back if you would just trust me –”

“Trust you? _Trust you?_ After all of this? I can’t even trust you to lock your own front –”

“You’re bringing the front door into this? Really? You really want to make this about the fucking lock on the fucking –”

“No, now I’m just bringing up everything you do that pisses me off, because _I’m pissed off!”_  

“Oh my god, you drive me _crazy!_ ” Jack yelled, tugging at his own hair.

“How can I, when you’re already there!” Rhys shouted back.

“Fine, you want to so bad, go to the stupid fucking wedding!” Jack yelled. “Get shot in the face by bandits! Get roofied and have your organs stolen by black market quacks! Catch some stupid Pandora disease and die of the _fucking plague!_ See if I care!”

“Fine, I will! Go to the wedding, not that other stuff because it’s totally irrational!”

“It’s not irrational, it’s _Pandora!_ ”

“Yeah, well…!” Rhys responded maturely.

He flipped Jack off with both his hands and backed into the bedroom, where he slammed and locked the door.

He was spitefully pleased to hear a loud crashing sound a few seconds later.

Then there was a sad whinny, which he felt less good about. He hoped whatever Jack had thrown hadn’t actually hit Butt Stallion. She _was_ made of diamonds, so it wouldn’t hurt her, but it was the principle of the thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the next chapter might take a while as i'm currently nearing finals week. thanks in advance for your patience!
> 
> thank you (once again!!!) to [[@srahhh]](http://twitter.com/srahhh) and [[@everkinged]](http://twitter.com/everkinged) 4 my life...
> 
> and thank you to all of you for your support! i really appreciate any kind of feedback you want to give me! i'm sorry if it takes me a while to respond... it takes me a long time and things became kind of busy recently! but i love you all very much. <3


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